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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28663488">Life Got Better</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshinemellow/pseuds/sunshinemellow'>sunshinemellow</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aged-Up Character(s), Anbu Haruno Sakura, Anbu Hatake Kakashi, BAMF Haruno Sakura, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, Romance, takes place 10ish years after the war</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 04:21:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>21,672</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28663488</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshinemellow/pseuds/sunshinemellow</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sakura steals Kakashi's mission and he isn't exactly thrilled about it. He realizes there are parts of Sakura he has never seen before, and he's learning how to reckon with them. </p><p> </p><hr/><p>
  <em>"He understood now that she had been filtering herself for the last several years. This person, fierce, intense, willing to do that which others weren’t, walking the line between the living and the dead—this person was Sakura. And she was captivating." </em>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Haruno Sakura &amp; Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura/Hatake Kakashi</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>372</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Naruto gems, Strong BAMF Sakura</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Life Got Better</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He knew her voice.</p><p>He supposed he would recognize any of his past teammate’s voices, but the sudden familiarity of it was jarring and he half expected himself to be wrong when he whipped around to stare at the white and red mask. The red porcelain curled in whorls over the cheeks and in lines beneath the mask’s narrow eye slits where he knew he would find <em>green</em>. He saw the caution in her eyes, a wary reminder that the steps she had taken to disguise her hair and other features weren’t intended to be in vain.</p><p>She cleared her throat, and he expected to hear a waver or some hint of mutual recognition, but he heard nothing as she evenly repeated, “My team is here to relieve yours.”</p><p>He stared. Yes, Ferret had been given a nasty belly wound when they made their first move on the target, and yes it had put the enemy on their guards, but an extraction like this was rare. Their mission had been made more dangerous, it was true, but to be relieved of it was odd. It must have come from—</p><p>Yes, he thought as he stared at her for another long moment. Naruto must have been sticking his long arm back into ANBU affairs where it didn’t belong. They must have told him that no team was willing to take on the extra risk of overhauling a half-finished mission, and she must have told them that hers was.</p><p>Her team.</p><p>“Captain?”</p><p>His mouth went dry as he realized the title hadn’t been directed to him, but rather to her. He felt like she was reading her own death sentence as she shifted in her crouched position in the underbrush and replied, “No need to worry, Falcon. Hound’s team has had a long month. He’s just mulling over what we need to know before they can go on their way.”</p><p>“What if we stayed,” he asked without thinking.</p><p>He saw the flicker of the familiar fury in her eyes now—a piece of the past he had finally been successful in dredging up. Yet there was something colder underneath it; something much more certain than the flames and bluster that had been there before. There was a control to this anger— a certain sharpness.</p><p>“Then you would be disobeying orders, Hound. And I don’t intend to be responsible for the fallout.”</p><p>Orders, he nearly snorted. Since when did <em>any </em>of us care about <em>orders. </em>But then he reminded himself that this wasn’t Team Seven, that both he and she were responsible for the lives of their new teammates who didn’t have the same brand of insanity that their original team members had. That the men on the other side of the forest were not robbers or looters and that he could not neatly shuffle his students out of harm’s way if things became too dangerous. That he no longer had <em>students</em>, and hadn’t for a good decade.</p><p>That she had never, under his miserably lacking and unenthusiastic instruction, ever truly been treated as a student.</p><p>“All right,” he heard himself saying with a certain level of numbness, wondering if he would pinpoint this as the moment of fault if she never returned from the mission and he was left with another name to stare at on the memorial. “Here is what you need to know.”</p><p>He laid out the mission in detail, hiding none of their shortcomings or mistakes. He told her about their failed attempt on the life of the kingpin and the skills that his guards had. As he spoke, he noticed she was tapping out a silent pattern on the protruding root of a tree. He watched her team respond in unison with what must have been a tapped sign of understanding or agreement.</p><p>She had taught them a silent, shared language, most likely for efficiency rather than secrecy given that she was making no attempt to hide it from him. He wondered if it was an effort to replace what their own team had once shared—a silent way of communicating, a shared wavelength that they had all operated on. But then again, hadn’t their time as a team been plagued with miscommunication, with an inability to understand one another’s actions and abuses?</p><p>“That’s it,” he finally found himself saying.</p><p>She gave him a short nod. “Thank you, Hound.”</p><p>“You’re welcome, Tiger.”</p><p>He held her gaze for a moment longer, until he was sure she saw the accusation there. She turned away, a new tension in her shoulders.</p><p>“I’ll patch up Ferret before you begin your journey back.”</p><p>As she knelt by his teammate and her hands lit up with chakra, he wondered how long Sakura had been in the ANBU. Judging by her captain status, it was certainly long enough. She must have joined when he was still Hokage, before Naruto started poking around in ANBU affairs. Naruto would never have let her join, and an uncomfortably warm feeling of guilt reminded Kakashi that if he had been more aware of her actions during his own term, he would have been able to prevent it as well. </p><p>Was it Naruto’s idea to send her here, or had it been something that she had brought to his attention? He had no doubt that they were acting together as members of the same fragmented family. He was trying to figure out a way to pull her to the side for a private conversation when she turned back to him.</p><p>“You should be good for travel now.” She hesitated in what would have been an imperceptible pause to anyone who didn’t know the rise and fall of her voice in all its expressions of guilt, vulnerability, and anger. “Make sure you get back safely.”</p><p>He knew then that she wouldn’t be giving him a chance to pull her aside and treat her as anything other than an ANBU captain sent to relieve him. That was her goodbye, and he could either take it or leave it. He nodded, his chest tightening.</p><p>“Thank you for your assistance, Tiger.”</p><p>He forced himself not to look back when he left.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>He heard that she had returned from Shikamaru.</p><p>Shikamaru had wrangled him into a shogi match that they both knew Kakashi would lose, though not without putting up a decent fight. Kakashi had made his peace with the fact that simply entertaining Shikamaru during a shogi match was a feat in and of itself.</p><p>Kakashi watched the man across from him take a long drag from his cigarette and study the board while he kept half an eye on the café where Temari was getting lunch with Tenten. Kakashi had sniped a joke earlier about Shikamaru waiting to jump to attention when Temari returned, and he had been given nothing but a disgruntled <em>hmph</em> in return, followed by a particularly devastating blow on the board that left him floundering for the next several turns.</p><p>“What a drag,” Shikamaru finally drawled, leaning back and blowing up a thin curl of smoke. “I’ve played this game out a hundred different ways in my head and I don’t think there is a single way you can win at this point.”</p><p>Kakashi ignored a small pang of irritation, knowing Shikamaru was gloating in much the same way that he had once gloated when he delegated horrendous stacks of paperwork to him during his time as Hokage. He smiled blandly, tapping his fingers on the corner of the table.</p><p>“I was aware my odds weren’t good before we started, but you might be a little overconfident. I have been known to surprise.”</p><p>Shikamaru rolled one of his shoulders. “Nah. The only person other than Asuma who manages to surprise me every so often is Sakura. She wins about one in four now, but it’s only because she learned by playing me so often. She hates to lose.”</p><p>Kakashi felt a now familiar drag at his attention span and his mind wandered back to the mission he had left her on nearly a month ago. The first few days he had sulked, furious that his work had been tampered with and guilty that he hadn’t come up with a reason that would have enabled him to stay on the mission. Now it was like a dull ache at the back of his mind that started up again whenever he heard her name in the ambient sound of people living their lives around him—a delayed appointment she had missed with Kiba for mending some scar tissue around torn ligaments in his knee, Ino complaining about the size of Sakura’s plant collection that she had to keep watered while she was away, Tsunade griping about having to show up to work at the hospital each day to fill in for Sakura during her “medical outreach mission,” as if Tsundade hadn’t done her “goddamned share of work and then some.” He refused to think about whether or not Sakura would make it back in one piece.</p><p>She would.</p><p>Shikamaru let out a long yawn, scuffing his sandal against the sand. “If you take any longer to make your move I’ll just go play a game with Sakura. Wouldn’t be losing much time it seems—”</p><p>He jolted from his mind’s wanderings and the world snapped into clarity. He almost had to restrain himself from reaching across the table to shake Shikamaru by his shirt.</p><p>“Sakura is back?” he snapped.</p><p>Shikamaru blinked at him owlishly, and then his eyes grew calculating. Kakashi realized that he had done something unpredictable. Shikamaru only made that face when he had been presented with a new and interesting puzzle.</p><p>“Yeah, she’s at the hospital. They got back last night.”</p><p>His mind spun. He should have insisted on staying. He knew it would be his fault if she got hurt because he handed over a half-done and botched mission.</p><p>“Is she in a stable—”</p><p>Shikamaru snorted. “She’s at the hospital because she works there, or at least she does when she isn’t off getting her jitters out on black ops missions. Naruto was against it when he found out, but I think it’s done wonders for her bedside manner.”</p><p>Kakashi rocked back in his seat and a wave of numbness washed over him. “You knew she’s in the ANBU?”</p><p>“Yeah, didn’t you? Has been for about three and a half years now. Naruto still threatens to force her to quit and become some kind of ambassador, but she delivers his kids and Hinata told him that if he makes Sakura angry enough to stop there won’t be any more kids to deliver.”</p><p>Kakashi felt a corner of his lips twitch up in response to the amused smirk on Shikamaru’s face, which was clearly at Naruto’s expense. As if Temari didn’t keep him in line. He drummed his fingers against the table as something cold washed over him. Kakashi was wondering about the dull ache at the back of his mind, and then he realized—</p><p>Betrayal.</p><p>He felt betrayed.</p><p>He stood and ran an absent hand through his hair as Shikamaru glared up at him. “I’m afraid you’re right, Shikamaru. There really isn’t any way I can win this. Congratulations.”</p><p>Shikamaru blew an unimpressed stream of smoke out of the corner of his mouth as he sagged back into his chair, giving him a disgusted snort. “Coward. You’re just like her—neither of you can handle losing.”</p><p>Kakashi shrugged in what he intended as agreement, but it ended up feeling much more like he was trying to shake some new and invisible weight from his shoulders. “Next time we’ll play it through.”</p><p>He held his hand up in goodbye, shuffling away before he could be rebuked further. He found his feet leading him to the hospital as arguments danced around the fringes of his mind.</p><p><em>How could you not tell me? I was your sensei.</em> </p><p>Wrong, wouldn’t work. He could already hear her rebuttal. It would just be another reminder that he had abandoned her training not long after he taught her the critical skills of how to climb trees and disobey orders. Clearly only one of those lessons had stuck.</p><p>
  <em>We were teammates. How could you have kept this from me?</em>
</p><p>He sighed at the sudden enormity of the drama that seemed to be bound up in the word <em>teammate. </em>He felt, for what felt like the millionth time, that the word should never have been allowed to apply to him. Not when he had seen time and time again the wretchedness of those who had suffered the consequences of being on one of his teams.</p><p>Before he knew it, he was ambling along the white hallway that lead to her office and ignoring the curious glances shot his way by the medical staff. He was sure they all knew about his reputation for being, as Sakura put it, a real pain in the ass of a patient. He never came to the hospital willingly. He came in the headlock of Sakura or Shikamaru, or not at all.</p><p>He knocked his knuckles on her door and immediately found himself wishing that he hadn’t. Who was he, to be knocking at her door like one of the people who worked for her? It wasn’t as if they hadn’t nearly died next to each other a couple hundred times. He should have let himself in through the window to make her pay for yanking his mission out from under him. He found himself walking in before she could respond and he was opening his mouth to say God knew what when he stopped short.</p><p>Her head was braced in her hands, elbows on her desk in a posture so reminiscent of Tsunade that he almost thought he had gone to the wrong office. He stood speechless and somewhat in awe of the deep level of <em>fatigue </em>and <em>experience</em> in the tired set of her shoulders. It made him feel suddenly and intensely small.</p><p>Then the image shattered as her head snapped up, an old wrath in her eyes. “I <em>told you </em>not to come barging in here after a long surgery! Tsunade is on the <em>we need a miracle worker </em>shift right now and if she wasn’t the one who sent you there will be hell to—”</p><p>She broke off as her eyes focused on him, glossy and red with fatigue and anger before they flashed with recognition. She blinked at him in surprise and he found himself blinking back, unsure of what to do and feeling entirely out of his depth.</p><p>He watched as wariness filled her gaze. She sat up and squared her shoulders. If he hadn’t found her caved over her desk, he never would have known she was anything but composed and irritated. He supposed in some ways she had become more adept at switching between masks than even he was.</p><p>“Hi, Kakashi,” she said in a clipped voice. “Did you need something—”</p><p>“You took my mission,” he snapped as the residual feelings of rage began to seep back.</p><p>Her eyes flashed dangerously. “You mean the mission you nearly failed?”</p><p>“I shouldn’t need to remind you of this, Sakura, but even though missions don’t always go according to plan they aren’t—”</p><p>“What, so you three were going to hobble into the compound and break up the trafficking ring without at least one of you ending up dead? Please, by the time I got there Ferret was about to start leaking his guts everywhere. You might have finished the mission, but at what cost?”</p><p>“I know my team,” he said coldly.</p><p>Suddenly they both seemed to hear the irony of his words. He felt himself grow still, and he watched her eyes fill with what was at once an old fatigue and a quiet bitterness.</p><p>“Right,” she muttered, all performance of being put-together slipping away as she leaned back her chair and regarded him with a heavy gaze. He noticed the edge of a fading red scar running along her collarbone, the rest hidden by the folds of her medical coat. She had new bags under her eyes, and the edges of bandages were barely visible under the tips of her white sleeves.</p><p>“<em>Obviously, </em>you’ve always known your teammates very well, Kakashi,” she sighed as she leaned further back and massaged her temples. “I don’t have the energy to debate this with you further, but I’ll be in a better mood tomorrow. Why don’t you go read some porn or find some lost kittens in the meantime?”</p><p>For the first time in a long time, he felt words slice him to his core. Part of him wanted to flee, the wounded, angry, and embarrassed creature he had always been, but another part of him knew that if he left now, he would be leaving behind a damage that would never mend properly. </p><p>He let out a long sigh and shuffled forward to the chair she had in front of her desk. He sank down into it, staring off at a point somewhere behind her head, feeling deeply tired.</p><p>They sat in a prickly silence that grew less charged by the second. The years of coping with the unimaginable had drained him of the ability to sustain any strong emotion for longer than a short burst of time. He suspected Sakura had reached a similar point.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” he finally said into what was beginning to feel like a neutral silence. “I know I never paid enough attention to you all those years ago. Tsunade became what I should have been for you.”</p><p>Sakura sighed. “You don’t have to apologize, Kakashi. That’s old baggage. We fought in a war together, you’ve seen me at my lowest. You might not have been my teacher, but you were there when it mattered.”</p><p>He felt a weight that he hadn’t realized he was carrying around with him begin to lift. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen Sakura at all over the last few years—he saw her at larger gatherings and brought her the occasional takeout that they shared in comfortable and exhausted silence in her office or on the roof of the hospital. He was more upset by the fact that she had been living what now, felt to him, like a double life. The red curls of her ANBU tattoo had been there under her sleeve for all those years, for all those lunches or drinks with friends. What he had thought were just bags under her eyes from overworking were probably from sleepless nights after bad missions. He had never wanted that for her or any of his students, but he was beginning to realize she was long past the point of asking for his input or guidance, and had been for many years.</p><p>“Besides,” she said, snapping him out of his thoughts. “Sharingan or not, there’s no way you could have copied my chakra control. You wouldn’t have known how to teach me to use it.”</p><p>“Oh really? I seem to remember the last time we sparred—”</p><p>Her glare turned venomous. “That was <em>years </em>ago and I’ll have you know I could knock you flat on your ass—”</p><p>He chuckled with the sheer relief of recognizing something familiar from her and she stopped, bemused, before a small smile spread over her face. “I mean it,” she muttered half-heartedly as she relaxed. “If we hadn’t spent so long rebuilding this hospital there would be a Kakashi-shaped hole in the wall.”</p><p>“I don’t doubt it,” he said, rubbing at an old ache in the side of his wrist. He felt her eyes follow the movement, the exceptional medic that she was, and her gaze narrowed at him.</p><p>“I take it you haven’t been making trauma repair appointments like anyone who uses a damaging jutsu should.”</p><p>He tried to smile benignly, but he already knew the face of bland noninterest that had confused many a diplomat during his time as Hokage would be brushed aside by her in an instant. “You know, I make the appointments, but something always comes up right before—”</p><p>“Impossible,” she was already muttering, one hand back on her forehead and another gesturing him forward.</p><p>“Did you change your mind about the Kakashi-shaped hole—”</p><p>“Not enough energy for that, but plenty to dissolve some of the scarring around your tendons.”</p><p>“I would rather not—”</p><p>“Kakashi,” she said, tired green eyes flashing up to meet his, stopping him in his tracks. It had been awhile since someone had managed to pin him with just a look, and part of him ached to know what she had been doing the last few years that allowed her to manage it. He stood wordlessly and came over to her desk, extending his arm.</p><p>“Thank you,” she mumbled in exasperation, her eyes already fixed on his wrist. Her fingers clasped around his forearm and pulled it closer to her face. She puffed a piece of hair out of the corner of her eyes and watched his wrist intently, gently tilting it from side to side.</p><p>He felt something strange rising in his chest as he watched her. An old self-defense mechanism flickered to life and a dry joke was on the tip of his tongue before he could stop himself from breaking the gentle silence.</p><p>“I didn’t know you could see chakra pathways. You didn’t steal any clan secrets from the Hyūga did you?”</p><p>“Something like that,” she mumbled distantly. She must have felt him tense with surprise because her eyes flicked lazily to his, a sly grin at the corner of her lips. “Nice benefit of my chakra control—I can feel how your chakra is flowing inside of you. Not with my eyes but with my senses. Looking just helps me focus.”</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>She kept her eyes on his as he felt the slow warmth of her chakra sinking into his wrist, setting to right old injuries and strains that had embedded themselves in his tissue. Her smile grew as she watched him. “See? No looking.”</p><p>He was positive his shock and incredulity was written all over his face—she knew he was squeamish about his healing and she had the audacity to do it without even looking. It wasn’t a mean joke, but it was a more self-indulgent and irreverent one than he ever would have remembered her making. He wondered if her humor had gained this edge after a slew of hellish black ops missions, or if she was simply too tired to filter herself for his benefit now that he knew the truth.  </p><p>“All done,” she said with one last knowing smile, tapping his arm as if it were a machine she had just repaired. “Should be running like brand new.”</p><p>“Thanks,” he grumbled, feeling thoroughly put off balance as he flexed his wrist, which did indeed feel like it had been stripped of ten years of misuse. “I bet one of the nurses would have been nicer about it.”</p><p>She laughed, rubbing a tired hand over her face. He suddenly felt guilty—he had come here to yell at her for saving him from a mission he didn’t have the resources to safely complete, found her exhausted and overwhelmed, and somehow managed to get a private healing out of her. He was about to give her what no doubt would have been a jumbled and lacking apology when she spoke.</p><p>“You’re finally catching on, Kakashi. I’m not the person people come to when they want <em>niceness </em>anymore.”</p><p>He gazed down at her, surprised at the new bitter undercurrent to her words. He forced himself to refocus and look at her clearly, as if he were seeing her for the first time. He saw a woman who was exhausted and clearly overworked, burdened with responsibilities that she had grown too exclusive and skilled in to be able to foist them off onto someone else. He realized, perhaps for the first time, that there were patients who died if Sakura was not there to tend to them herself. Then he remembered she was moonlighting as an ANBU agent under the guise of medical outreach and had to smother a grimace.</p><p>He supposed it was an odd though not a senseless means of coping—she restored lives and then took them in some perverse semblance of balance, though he had the feeling there was very little actual balance in her life. It seemed to him like a continual dance of cleaning and then bloodying the hands over and over again. Then again, he had never managed to scrape any of the blood off his own hands, so who was he to judge her for trying?</p><p>He was jolted from his thoughts when she cracked an eye open at him, peering up between her lashes and the dark circles underneath her eyes. “Can I help you with anything else, Kakashi?”</p><p>“Why are you here the day after your mission? Shouldn’t you be taking a break?”</p><p>She shrugged. “Try telling Tsunade she has to cover more of my shifts. She’s already spending half the day here today so I can come snooze in here between surgeries. She isn’t exactly thrilled that my work at the hospital has become my day job.”</p><p>“Isn’t there someone else—”</p><p>“No.”</p><p>He watched her for a long moment, leaning against her desk beside her and feeling entirely like a pest, but somehow unwilling to leave at the same time.</p><p>“Why did you join the ANBU?”</p><p>Her eyes flickered back open and she regarded him cautiously. “I think it is against the rules to talk about—”</p><p>He snorted and she smiled. “Fine. I joined because I could feel myself losing some of the skills I had spent a long time developing. I needed to get out of the village. I tried going on missions with other jōnin but they treated me like some village healing treasure—like they were my bodyguards.”</p><p>He scowled, knowing her shoddy excuse of wanting to maintain her skills wasn’t the real reason she had joined the ANBU. “Protecting the medic-nin on a mission is typical procedure—”</p><p>“Right.” She rolled her eyes. “You remember when Tsunade got chopped in half and she bounced back? She taught me that trick if things ever get too dire.”</p><p>“So you wanted the anonymity. How do you manage with such a distinct fighting style?”</p><p>She grinned. “Is that your polite way of asking if I still smash things and have a catchphrase?”</p><p>He couldn’t help but chuckle. “Sure.”</p><p>“Well,” she said, stretching her arms above her head and arching her back, clearly having given up on her attempt to nap. “Tiger doesn’t punch the ground or use trees as clubs, but she can break through body armor or throw people pretty hard. Enough to raise a few eyebrows, but nothing too obvious. Sometimes she uses reinforced swords provided by the Konoha weapons mistress. An old and inept teacher of hers once observed that she was suited to genjutsu, and she dabbles in that from time to time.”</p><p>“Tenten armed you,” he said blankly, imaging someone thinking that it was a good idea to give Sakura a sharp weapon and marveling at the fact that Naruto still had his head.</p><p>“Taught me how to use them, too, in case you’re still looking to add to the long list of the ways you were lacking as a teacher.”</p><p>“I thought we had agreed—”</p><p>He broke off when he noticed the teasing mirth in her eyes and resisted the urge to flick her. Her sense of humor wasn’t new, but he wasn’t used to being the target of its sharper side. “And your healing? How do you get out of the medic treatment in the ANBU?”</p><p>“You know there aren’t enough medics to go around in the ANBU for there to be any actual procedures for them, and everyone stupid enough to sign on is expected to be able to handle themselves.”</p><p>She silenced his protest with a glare and continued. “I’ve never needed to get chopped in half to prove it, but my team is at least semi-aware that I bounce back quicker than most when it comes to life-threatening injuries.”</p><p>Kakashi had to choke back the horror rising in his throat. “There is no way Naruto lets you play decoy—”</p><p>“Hey,” she snapped, some of the old anger he remembered bubbling back up and seeping into her gaze. “Naruto doesn’t <em>let </em>me do anything. Naruto might have seen his fair share of carnage and then some, but he has never been in the ANBU. I’m sharing this because you have, and I expect you to <em>get it</em>. If you go tattling to Naruto with scary stories, I’ll make every single one of your organs explode.”</p><p>He glared back at her, but something about the speed with which she had come up with her threat made him think that she had done it before. He ignored the turn of his stomach and tried to force down his rising frustration. He felt like he was having a conversation with someone who was painfully familiar and yet a complete stranger. He was running out of questions and kinds of information to wheedle out of her, and he had to suppress the urge to just ask her to explain herself.</p><p>“Question time is over, Kakashi,” she said abruptly, standing from her chair and knocking him off the side of her desk with her hip. “This is starting to feel like an interrogation, and I get plenty of that from Ino. You can come back when you’re feeling less judgmental.”</p><p>“Judgmental,” he repeated with incredulity.</p><p>“Yes,” she snapped over her shoulder. “If you want more questions answered, you’re going to have to venture outside of the hermit hole you call your apartment and find me at a social event or offer to buy me food and drinks. I’m not picky about which.”</p><p>“What makes you think I’m willing to do that?” he asked, and immediately regretted it.</p><p>She paused with her hand on the door, and he heard her inhale slowly before she turned to face him, eyes bright with irritation and an undercurrent of an old hurt.</p><p>“Look, Kakashi, it’s been nearly a decade since we’ve been on the same team. If you think that you can barge into my office and that I will be <em>thrilled </em>because you’ve finally decided to take me seriously, I hate to inform you that you’re wrong. If you want me to dump all my secrets out for you to inspect and pass judgement on, you’re going to have to reciprocate, even if it is just a <em>tiny </em>bit.”</p><p>He stared at her, struck dumb, feeling his jaw flex as he tried to formulate what was halfway between an argument and an apology. She gave him one last withering look as she let herself out of her office, the door clicking shut with a soft finality behind her.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>He shambled into the flower shop, trying and failing to be inconspicuous when a bright voice announced his presence.</p><p>“Kakashi! Over here!”</p><p>He made his way unwillingly to the counter where Ino was grinning as if she had just cornered a juicy piece of gossip as he studiously ignored the raised heads of the other customers.</p><p>“You know, if I had to bet on one person never showing up here in the flesh, it would have been you. Have you finally found a special someone to send—”</p><p>He cleared his throat loudly and she scowled at him for interrupting her. “Nothing special, Ino. I’m just here to make a gesture for a… friend.”</p><p>She raised an elegant eyebrow at him. “Oooookay,” she said, mimicking his long pause and the uncertain tone of his voice. He immediately decided that the sharper new pieces of Sakura’s humor had not in fact been developed as a response to ANBU gallows humor and were instead attributable directly to Ino. “What kind of gesture are we trying to make here and for whom?”</p><p>“Well,” he shifted uncomfortably, and he watched Ino’s eyes track the movement with interest. He remembered she was highly trained in information extraction and had to stifle a resigned sigh. “I think I need to apologize, but in a subtle way.”</p><p>Her eyebrows rose higher. “A subtle way?”</p><p>“Well, yes, subtle, but clear. It has to be clear that it is an apology of sorts. But a subtle one.”</p><p>“Right, right,” she said, failing to hide a small smile. “There are lots of kinds of apology flowers, and I’m sure you don’t want to be sending any mixed signals. I think you’re going to have to tell me a little bit about what you’re apologizing for.”</p><p>He felt his face heating under his mask as he met her gaze, but he already felt himself caving to the malicious and interested glint in her eyes. He knew if he left her without any information at all that she would make an absurd arrangement just to spite him.</p><p>“Well, I think I might have overstepped some boundaries. Nothing serious, of course, but I think I asked a little too much of someone.”</p><p>“Uh huh, uh huh,” she mumbled encouragingly, snatching up a pad of paper and a pen. “And what exactly were these boundaries?”</p><p>“I asked a lot of personal questions, might have come off as a little judgmental… This was poorly received because I myself am not the most… open person.”</p><p>Ino’s gaze flicked from the paper to him and she gave him a piercing and dry look. “You don’t say, Kakashi.”</p><p>He cleared his throat again, feeling as though Ino had managed to recreate the T&amp;I torture cell atmosphere surprisingly well given that they were speaking in a well-lit and airy flower shop. “What I want to say is that in the past I might not have been as… available or helpful as I should have to this person. I want to say that I’m trying to change that, and that I want to do better.”</p><p>Ino nodded. “That is an admirable sentiment, Kakashi.”</p><p>He grunted in response and she shot him an amused glance as she continued to scribble on the paper. “Tulips will be a good base. They’re for new beginnings, a little bit like the coming of springtime. I think white ones would be nice. Then some ivy for fidelity, you know, since it clings to things. I’ll mix in some other odds and ends.”</p><p>He felt some tension leave his body with the relief of having a means to apologize laid out for him. “Thank you, Ino.”</p><p>“Whose address do I deliver them to?”</p><p>His mouth went dry. “Couldn’t I just write it on an order form? For the delivery person?”</p><p>She scowled. “We’re a family business, Kakashi, we do these deliveries ourselves. I’ll find out eventually when I’m drawing up the delivery schedule. We’re discreet, we won’t publish the information.”</p><p>“Right, right,” he said, bracing himself. “You could just send them to the hospital.”</p><p>“You’re apologizing to the whole hospital?”</p><p>“No,” he muttered. “Just a person inside.”</p><p>Her brow knit with impatience. “A patient then?”</p><p>“No, not a patient. You could just send it to… send it to the administration staff.”</p><p>Ino’s eyes flooded with understanding and she regarded him with surprise and then amusement. “Administration? Hm… Could these be for Shizune? Or maybe... Tsunade?”</p><p>He glowered at her, knowing that she would torture him until he put an end to it. “No, they’re for Sakura.”</p><p>“Ah,” Ino cried, her eyes dancing. “How could I have been so silly? Why don’t we mix in some Sakura blossoms then?”</p><p>He shifted his weight. “If you think that is still subtle—”</p><p>“Sure, sure,” Ino interrupted, scribbling on her pad again with a renewed vigor. “You could whack Sakura over the head with all of this and it might not manage to penetrate that thick skull of hers. We all had to take those awful kunoichi language of flowers classes, so the base understanding will be there, but I’ll make sure it all gets through. No need to worry, Kakashi!”</p><p>He watched warily, somehow feeling that Ino had gone from vaguely interested to manic within the span of a minute. “And this will all be subtly done, Ino? Like we dicussed?”</p><p>“Sure, sure,” she said again, with a particularly concerning and enthusiastic flourish of her pen on her notepad. “Very classy, very elegant. Very nice.”</p><p>“Very nice,” he repeated dumbly, beginning to feel like he had made a massive mistake.</p><p>“Now shoo, Kakashi, let me get this all taken care of for you.” She grinned. “Unless there was something else you wanted to say to Sakura that I can work in—”</p><p>He raised his hands in a <em>please stop</em> gesture, certain that she would continue to psychoanalyze and wheedle more information out of him unless he put an end to it. “Should I pay now or—”</p><p>“Nonsense!” She practically shouted, and he felt himself jump at the sudden increase in volume. “No Hokage pays here, past or present!”</p><p>His eyes narrowed. “I remember Tsunade complaining about one of your bills for—”</p><p>“Nonsense!” Ino cried again, and he felt himself take an involuntary step backwards. “Sakura is a dear friend of mine, as I am sure you know, but of course we always protect the discretion of our customers. I should be thanking you for letting me do something nice for her.”</p><p>“Right,” he said, certain that the train had fully gone off the tracks at this point and that any attempts on his end to salvage the situation would be met with disaster. “Thank you then, Ino.”</p><p>He turned before he could be questioned or tortured further and shambled back out of the shop, keeping his head firmly down on his way out. It was a start. A botched start, perhaps, but a start nonetheless.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Kakashi allowed himself to be steered into the bar by Gai, his head still foggy from their spar as Genma, Kurenai, and Asuma stumbled in along with them. They all smelled like dirt, sweat, and maybe a little bit like blood, but it was a bar frequented by enough ninja that it was unlikely they would end up kicked out. They made their way to the stools by the bar and Kakashi distantly registered Genma ordering them a round of drinks behind his cloud of exhaustion.</p><p>He was just easing himself onto a seat when he heard raucous laugher that made him jolt to attention. His eyes sought out the source, and he quickly located the pink head of hair tucked away in a booth in the corner of the bar next to Ino, Shikamaru, and Tenten. She had her hands covering her face as if she were choking as Shikamaru thumped her hard on the back. Kakashi couldn’t help the small smile that unfolded underneath his mask—many things might have changed, but at least she still laughed easily enough.</p><p>He turned his attention back to his friends, intent on pretending he hadn’t realized she was there. There were many things he didn’t want to contend with, and one of them was a conversation with Sakura while he was exhausted and on his way to getting drunk. He had been thinking about her more often than he wanted to recently. The flowers had been delivered a week ago, but he still hadn’t quite mustered up the courage to go crawling back to her office. He wasn’t sure what he was more afraid of—finding her gone on another mission, or finding her there with the same sharp and teasing light in her eyes that made him feel like he was being picked apart.</p><p>The afternoon wore on and he felt the fog in his head growing as he allowed Genma to pour him refills from the pitcher of beer they had ordered. Genma complained about another failed attempt at flirting with Ino while Kurenai thumped him over the head for thinking it was a good idea to try it while she was on her shift at T&amp;I. Asuma smoked with an easy grin on his face, subtly egging Gai on as he began to detail all of the accomplishments of his new students. Kakashi interjected here and there, content to watch quietly as his mind drifted back and forth between the conversation and the obnoxious buzzing awareness that Sakura was sitting somewhere behind him.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>“Forehead,” Ino whisper-slurred into her ear. “Look over there.”</p><p>Sakura cringed and wiped at the spit Ino had left on her ear, but obediently followed the finger Ino was jabbing at the bar with her eyes. She felt herself stiffen when she recognized the familiar head of silver hair. His back was positioned squarely to them, and Sakura felt her eyes narrow. In some ways Kakashi was a master of subtlety, and in others he was surprisingly obvious.</p><p>“What about it, Ino-pig?”</p><p>Ino thumped her arm. “It isn’t every single day that a man who sends you flowers shows up at the bar the same time you do!”</p><p>Sakura snorted, despite the uncomfortable warmth she felt rising in her cheeks. She shot a quick glance at Shikamaru and Tenten to see if they had heard, but they were deep in conversation about whether or not blades could be constructed specifically for shadow jutsus.  </p><p>“Ino, Kakashi is not a <em>man who sends me flowers</em>. He’s a man who shows up at offices uninvited to reopen decade-old traumas and shove his foot into his mouth at maximal velocity.”</p><p>Ino glared at her. “I’ve told you all the <em>lovely </em>things he said about—”</p><p>“Yes, yes,” Sakura muttered into the rim of her drink. Ino had indeed gleefully showed up at her office toting a fragrant and beautiful armful of white flowers the very same day that Kakashi had come in to argue with her. Ino had told her how sheepish and miserable Kakashi looked, and how he had flushed at some of her more daring insinuations. Sakura had still been furious with him, but she had felt something unfolding inside of her that she found terribly frightening.</p><p>It had been years and years since the war and since she had been on a functional version of Team Seven. She found that behind a mask, with her hair disguised, and on teams with total strangers, there was an absolute freedom that she had never been able to find before during her career. There had always been Naruto or Sasuke, ready to hurl themselves in front of her in some perverse rivalry that had never truly felt like it had anything to do with her. Then she had been <em>hokage’s apprentice</em> and she became untouchable in an entirely different way.</p><p>Behind her mask, wearing the porcelain grimace that made her <em>Tiger</em>, she was free to take all the risks she wanted. She could call the shots, strategize with her team, hurl herself into dangerous situations without ending up scolded. She knew her limits, and she knew how far her seal could take her when she needed to use it.  </p><p>So when Kakashi had shown up, looking earnest and afraid for her behind his mask with undertones of frustration coloring his dark eyes, she had felt absolute <em>panic</em>. She didn’t want to go back to being coddled, or being treated as nice but fragile Sakura whose outbursts were more comical than actually frightening. She had gained control and <em>power </em>in these last few years. It almost felt like she had been forcibly unmasked, and like Kakashi had been disgusted by the hardened and somewhat jaded person she had become beneath the surface.</p><p>“Sakura,” Ino hissed sloppily into her ear.</p><p>“Ew, what,” Sakura grumbled, shoving Ino back with the sharp edge of her elbow.</p><p>“Are you going to avoid each other forever?”</p><p>Sakura met Ino’s sharp gaze and frowned. “No, I’m going to wait for him to apologize to my face like an actual adult.”</p><p>Ino moved surprisingly fast for someone so drunk, thumping Sakura over the head before she could throw up an arm in defense.  “Forehead, I know you <em>think</em> you know everything, but I don’t think you realize how similar you’ve become to him. You both are just going to go slinking around each other until it is impossible to talk at all, and then you’ll have ruined the whole relationship.”</p><p>Sakura scowled, but Ino met her gaze without flinching despite the drunken haze in her blue eyes. She gestured wordlessly to where Kakashi was now leaning against the bar alone, waiting for a fresh pitcher of beer to bring back to his friends. He had seemingly been delegated the duty as the soberest one of them all.</p><p>“Go talk to him,” Ino snapped.</p><p>Sakura sighed and stood, feeling herself sway a bit from the sudden motion. She burned a bit of the alcohol off with her chakra—enough so that she wasn’t drunk anymore, but not so much that she would be able to talk herself out of confronting him. “Fine, Ino,” she hissed, “But I’m cutting you off. Start drinking water so we can leave when I get back.”</p><p>She turned away before Ino could protest and suddenly felt as though the distance between her and Kakashi had grown several hundred feet. Well, she sighed internally. All things were done one step at a time.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Kakashi felt himself freeze when a familiar chakra signature swung itself onto the stool next to his. He turned slowly and found bright green eyes dancing at him with amusement, as if she knew he looked like a cornered animal and was relishing it.</p><p>“Hello, Kakashi,” she said.</p><p>He blinked at her and then sat up. “Hello, Sakura.”</p><p>“You know, I received the most lovely set of flowers last week after a very unpleasant encounter.”</p><p>“Did you?”</p><p>A corner of her lips twitched up into a lopsided grin and she leaned against the bar, watching him with gleaming eyes. “Yeah, I really loved them, but I couldn’t help but think it would have been nicer if the sender had brought them to me himself.”</p><p>He forced himself to meet her gaze evenly. “Well, the sender might have been feeling a little guilty. Maybe a little confused. I think he was trying his best, though.”</p><p>Her eyes softened. “Well,” she said quietly. “His efforts were very much appreciated.”</p><p>He was just opening his mouth to speak when her hand moved to the side of his forehead where he had felt blood crusting in his hair from his earlier spar with Asuma. He felt a warm flare of chakra against his skin, and the next instant the gash was gone before he was even aware of what had happened. He stared at Sakura, her green eyes unfocused and hazy as she briefly ran her thumb over the newly-healed skin.</p><p>“All better,” she murmured. Her hand dropped back to her lap. As he continued to stare she seemed to realize what she had done and flushed. “Sorry, bad habit. I see dirty wounds and I just have to patch them up. Should have asked permission.”</p><p>He nodded numbly, refusing to acknowledge the feeling that had unfurled in his chest at the brief and tender touch. “Right,” he said. “I get it.”</p><p>“So, what do you want to know?”</p><p> “What do you mean?”</p><p>“In my office you looked like you wanted to throttle me when I was answering your questions. You seemed unsatisfied. Ask me what you want to know.”</p><p>He met the hard and bright look in her eyes. She seemed defiant, but he could see shades of wariness behind the fierce look in her eyes. He felt pieces of understanding slide into place—this version of Sakura, the one she had become over the last few years, had dirty secrets. She had done terrible things behind the guise of her mask. She had made it through close calls, she had confronted her own mortality when she thought she would die, and she had reevaluated her code of ethics when she ended up surviving. She had been through enough of the vicious mission cycles in ANBU to understand.  </p><p>Enough to become something like him.</p><p>“Why did you decide to do it,” he heard himself ask, feeling as though he was seeing her for the first time.</p><p>She watched him with an inscrutable look in her eyes, and for a long moment he thought she wouldn’t respond. “Someone has to do it, Kakashi,” she said quietly. “It’s the only work I can do where I have something for myself. Something that is just for <em>me</em>.” She laughed with a bitter edge. “Besides, I have a seal that makes me virtually indestructible. How could I live with myself if I didn’t do the things that would leave others dead?”</p><p>His eyes were drawn to the pale seal sitting at the center of her forehead, and for the first time he felt as though he truly understood what it meant for her to use it. He saw his hand reaching out to rest against her forehead, the edge of her seal beneath his thumb. He felt the warmth of her skin and the bright chakra signature of the seal pressing against him. Part of his mind was demanding to know what he was doing, but the rest of him was simply fascinated by the depth of all the power and resilience resting underneath his finger.</p><p>His eyes flickered down from her seal and he found her watching him, her eyes darkened with an intensity that sent a shudder through him. He understood now that she had been filtering herself for the last several years. <em>This </em>person, fierce, intense, willing to do that which others weren’t, walking the line between the living and the dead—<em>this </em>person was Sakura. And she was captivating.</p><p>A throat cleared to the side of them and Kakashi jerked his hand away from Sakura as if burned. He turned to find Asuma, who had a poorly concealed smirk on his face.</p><p>“For two powerful ninja you’re surprisingly awful at sensing when someone is next to you.”</p><p>Kakashi heard himself spluttering, but Asuma’s smirk just widened. “Feel free to carry on. I just came for this,” he said, reaching between them for the fresh pitcher of beer on the counter that must have been left by the bartender without either of their notice. “We have some thirsty people over there, otherwise I wouldn’t have bothered you two. It looked important.”</p><p>Asuma shuffled off and Kakashi turned back to Sakura, finding her face nearly as pink as her hair. She met his gaze for a moment and then looked away. “Uh, I should go make sure Ino hasn’t puked on anything.”</p><p>“Right, that’s good,” he heard himself say, and then resisted the urge to smack his hand to his forehead. He knew he wasn’t truly drunk—just a little tipsy—but he had the feeling that when he was fully sober he was going to be furious with himself.</p><p>“Thank you, Kakashi.”</p><p>“For what—”</p><p>Before he could finish his sentence, he felt a feather-light touch against the side of his masked cheek, caught a brief scent of something floral and something rusty like sweat or blood. She gave him a small and sly smile as she leaned back.</p><p>“For seeing me,” she said.</p><p>He watched her walk back over to her booth where Ino was slumped over the table. Shikamaru seemed to be drawing things on the sides of Ino’s face while Tenten supervised. Kakashi sat very still for a moment, waiting to feel the inevitable rush of panic at the sudden intimacy, or the desire to sneak out of the bar without anyone noticing him.</p><p>It didn’t come.</p><p>As he sat there, Kakashi realized the only emotion registering for him was a warm feeling of being <em>alive</em>. He felt a small smile spread over his face under his mask before he pressed it away and made his way back to his friends as casually as he could.</p><p>Gai was monologuing with great vigor, which made it easy to slip back into their midst unnoticed. Asuma caught his eye and gave him a small grin, subtly tilting his glass toward him in a small and private toast. Kakashi kept his face carefully blank, but as he watched Sakura and her friends make their way out of the bar behind Asuma’s head, he couldn’t help the small upturn at the corner of his lips.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>After that point, Kakashi and Sakura began to see each other more often. Kakashi found himself drawn towards her office around noon each day. He would slip in through the window, find her hunched over some files looking both starved and exhausted, and wordlessly set takeout on her desk. She would grin up at him from her chair, somehow both pleased and surprised each time he came. Some of the days she was too drained from a surgery to speak, and they would sit chewing in silence. He would slip back out through the window feeling lighter each time.</p><p>A few weeks after they had seen each other in the bar, Gai managed to nick the side of Kakashi’s thigh with a kunai during a sparring session. Kakashi hadn’t thought it was serious, but twenty minutes later his leg buckled beneath him when he tried to feint to the side. He looked down and found his pant leg soaked through with blood. He had stared at it for a moment before he turned to a dumbstruck Gai and said, “I would like to be taken to Sakura.”</p><p>Gai, who seemed relieved that he didn’t have to coerce Kakashi into going to the hospital as per usual, slung him onto his back and took off. He babbled all the way about how everything would be fine and how they would be able to finish their fight once the lovely and youthful Sakura had fixed his leg. Kakashi found that for the first time in his life, he wasn’t worried about going to the hospital for treatment. Sakura’s office had started to feel like a safe place. He associated it with her, not with the smell of cloying antiseptic or beeping machines that came to mind when he thought of the hospital.</p><p>Gai trotted up the exterior wall of the hospital to the window Kakashi had indicated as Sakura’s. He undid the latch from the outside with a messy set of hand seals, and promptly stumbled over the windowsill in a jumble of leg warmers and blood with an increasingly dizzy Kakashi swaying on his back. Sakura, who had been poring over a stack of files, leapt to her feet with a yelp. She snatched Kakashi and set him on her desk, sending pens clattering to the floor and papers flying. Gai babbled in the background about how <em>youthfully strong as ever </em>she was and how Kakashi might as well have been a <em>baby bird given how light she made him seem </em>as her brow knit.</p><p>Kakashi watched through half-lidded eyes as she cut his pants away from the wound with a chakra scalpel and pressed her hand directly on the pulsing tear in his skin. He felt her chakra surging into his leg, seeking out damaged areas and knitting them back together with a searing speed. It seemed to only take a few moments before she was stepping back to assess the smooth and healed skin from a distance, pressing hair away from her forehead absently with her bloodied hand.</p><p>Kakashi stared at her, a streak of his blood smeared across her forehead, her eyes tired, exasperated, and tender all at once. Before he realized what he was doing he had reached out. His hand curled around her back and the other found her hair and then he was kissing her, soft and warm and appreciative through his mask as she grinned with surprise.</p><p>When they finally broke apart, he realized he was smiling, and somehow it felt like the most natural thing in the world. He was leaning back in for another muffled kiss when Sakura pressed a finger to his masked lips and jerked her head to the side. He looked and found Gai, finally struck silent, gawping at them with tears streaming down his face.</p><p>Kakashi cleared his throat and he heard Sakura snickering into his shoulder, her cold nose pressed against the fabric on his neck. “Thank you, Gai. Sakura will take it from here.”</p><p>“The <em>love, </em>the <em>joy</em>, the <em>BEAUTY </em>of your union will forever <em>remain imprinted upon my mind—</em>”</p><p>“That really is not necessary, and I would honestly rather that it didn’t, but thank you for the sentiment—”</p><p>“The sudden flourishing of your <em>youth, </em>my rival, <em>however late it might have come</em>—”</p><p>Kakashi slid off the desk, winding past Sakura. He pressed a hand to Gai’s shoulder and steered him gently but firmly back through the window. “Thank you, Gai, very nice things, yes, yes, I appreciate it.”</p><p>Gai waved one last tearful goodbye through the glass before setting back off down the side of the building, a new jaunt in his step. Kakashi leaned back against the desk and sighed. He snuck a look at Sakura out of the corner of his eyes and found her grinning.</p><p>“You decided now was the best moment to try that?” she asked. “After all the times you’ve shown up here with food and we had the office to ourselves?”</p><p>He shrugged, feeling somewhat sheepish. “I wanted to say thank you.”</p><p>“Would you like to say thank you one more time without your mask?”</p><p>He raised his eyebrows at her boldness but hooked his fingers in his mask and pulled it down so that it pooled around his neck. He suddenly realized when he had done when he felt the crushing sense of exposure. His eyes locked onto Sakura, waiting for her reaction.</p><p>Her eyes traced over his face, taking it in as a small and warm smile spread over her lips. She took a step towards him and tentatively reached out, as if she was half-expecting him to smack her hand away. He held himself still as her fingers settled gently against his bare cheek, the pad of her thumb sweeping over his cheekbone. She grinned slowly, meeting his eyes.</p><p>“You,” she whispered, as if she were informing him of a big secret, “are very handsome.”</p><p>He felt his face warm and he couldn’t quite help the satisfied smile that tugged at his lips. “I’ve been aware,” he tried to say nonchalantly, but he heard the tension in his own voice and saw how her eyes softened.</p><p>“I know this was hard for you,” she said quietly.</p><p>He shrugged. “It felt easier in the moment. You did use a rather compelling line.”</p><p>She rolled her eyes. “Hormones.”</p><p>He scowled and swatted at her side. “I seem to remember giving you a very thoughtful and considerate <em>thank you</em> and all I’ve been given in return is snark and—”</p><p>And then her lips were pressed against his, cutting him off and shutting down brain function. The sudden rush of sensation to his exposed face was electrifying, and he curled his hand into the back of her hair, the other flexing against her waist.</p><p>The rest of the night in her office was one of the best of his life, though no amount of pouting got him out of cleaning “his own damn blood” from his earlier injury off her desk.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Life got better.</p><p>The afternoon lunches became dinners at Sakura’s apartment, which had a messy and lived-in feeling that he hadn’t experienced since he was a child. She had wilting plants leaving watermarks on her windowsill, haphazardly clipped for dinner herbs. She had thick medical texts on poison theory and new chakra techniques sprawled across the coffee table with her commentary creeping out of their edges in a flurry of rainbow sticky notes. She had a heap of shoes by her door, some looking like death trap heels that she had dared him to try on one night. He had declined because she had seemed too tired from her day to heal the ankle he would have inevitably broken.</p><p>One night when he was preparing dinner for her to come home to, he found where she kept her first aid kit. He found it in the kitchen cabinet where he had been searching for table mats, and he felt himself grow very still when he saw old and rusty smears of bloody fingerprints on the white plastic, her name scrawled on the side of the lid in her messy handwriting. He found himself reaching for the case without thinking, and he carried it over to the couch where he could inspect it.</p><p>Inside there were clumsily resealed jars of antibacterial ointment scattered among half-used rolls of bandages. There was a spool of thread for stitches and its frayed end looked like it had been bitten off the last time it was used. He saw a small packet of ANBU blood-replenishing pills tucked in the corner of the box, just slightly peeking out of the mess. The small tin foil package was three quarters empty, and he watched his fingers slowly reach in and pick it up. He held it in his palm and stared at the empty places where the pills had once sat.</p><p>One gone for each time she had been at risk of bleeding out.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>She came home ten minutes later and sensed his chakra signature inside. She bounced into the living room with a grin on her face, halfway through a sentence about how well one of the new apprentices had handled a difficult emergency room patient before she realized that he was hunched over on her couch as if he had just been struck. His eyes were fixed on a small package of her blood-replenishing pills, his gaze unseeing as he held them in the palm of his hand.</p><p>Her stomach plummeted.</p><p>She took a slow step into the room. “Kakashi?”</p><p>His head raised and swung to hers, his dark eyes hollow. “What happened?” he asked.</p><p>She lowered herself down onto the couch beside him and wrapped her hands around his forearm, her thumb pressing against his wrist and rubbing slow circles into his skin. “What do you mean,” she whispered.</p><p>“Each of these spaces here where you needed one of the pills— what happened?”</p><p>His voice was level, but she knew him well enough to hear the quiet misery in it. She considered how best to handle this—he needed no lectures from her about how each ninja had to make their peace with the possibility of making the ultimate sacrifice on a mission. He understood that truth better than anyone.</p><p>What she had been realizing over the course of the last few weeks was that perhaps the ultimate sacrifice would be something much more precious than her own life. It would be this room, filled with their laughter in the evenings over dinner and the gleam in his eye when she teased him. It would be her too-small bed, left empty and smelling like her when he came to clear away her belongings in her absence. It would be her impromptu touch to his temple to soothe away the headache she could sense starting before even he could.</p><p>The sacrifice would be leaving him alone. And somehow, even after just a few weeks, the idea was excruciating.</p><p>She let out a quiet breath. “I needed them on missions, but I’m fine now. I’m here.”</p><p>She didn’t want to explain to him that she had needed the pills because she spent her time after battles healing her teammates first. Healing herself had become almost as natural as breathing; at times she felt like merely had to think about it and then her skin was knitting back together. And yet, she still had the same nightmare over and over—her wounded skin knitting together and sucking at her chakra while she watched the people she loved bleeding out around her, <em>begging </em>her to help while she healed only herself until there was no chakra left. She would tell him about this dream eventually, but not now. Now wasn’t the moment.</p><p>He turned to face her, something so deeply sad in his eyes that it made her heart ache. “I’m scared,” he said simply.</p><p>She felt heat of tears pricking at her eyes as she took the pill packet out of his hand and slid her fingers between his. “Me too,” she whispered. “Me too.”</p><p>They spent awhile sitting together in silence until he spoke again. “It feels like everyone I have ever loved has died.”</p><p>He said the words in such a plain and matter-of-fact tone of voice that she felt like she would crumple into pieces for the both of them.  </p><p>She gripped his hand as tightly as she could without seriously hurting him. “Well,” she said, thinking that she would tear the entire world to shreds if it meant she could give him back what he had lost. “I have a special seal which makes me very, very hard to kill. I seriously doubt there is something out there in the world that could prevent me from crawling back home to you.”</p><p>He watched her carefully, his gaze flickering between her seal and her eyes. She could see the beginnings of a small, sad smile tugging at his lips. “Even if you get chopped in half like Tsunade,” he asked.</p><p>“Especially if I get chopped in half.” She poked him in the side. “Although, sometimes I do wonder which half you would prefer to keep around if you had to pick one.”</p><p>He gaped at her and then glared. “What an appalling thing to say, Sakura.” She smirked, hearing the undercurrent of amusement in his voice.</p><p>“I could help you weigh the pros and cons—”</p><p>He shoved her off the couch and she yelped as her butt hit the floor. He stood and stretched with his arms over his head as she glared up at him. “Who knew I would end up with someone even more inappropriate and perverse than I am,” he seemed to muse to himself.</p><p>Sakura jabbed his ankle with her finger, allowing some of her chakra to lightly shock his nerve endings and he yelped, scowling down at her. “You know,” he said, amusement and softness dancing in his eyes. “You’re a real pest.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled, letting her head fall back against the leg of the couch. “You love me anyways.”</p><p>“I do.”</p><p>He was padding back to the kitchen and seemed to realize what he had said when she did. She stared at his back as he froze and she felt her breath catch in her throat.</p><p>“Kakashi,” she asked, her voice strained. “Did you just admit that you love me?”</p><p>He swiveled back around, his eyes wide. She watched his gaze sweep over her, then to the coffee table where two old mugs of their half-drunk tea were sitting, then to the small pile of his dirty laundry that was sitting by the door to the laundry room, then finally landing on the small stack of his porn books that she had begrudgingly allowed him to keep on her heap of research files. He looked back at her and blinked.</p><p>“Yes, I did,” he said, as if realizing it himself. “But I meant it. I love you.”</p><p>She sprang from her position on the ground and tackled him, half kissing him and half pinching him viciously in the side.</p><p>“You had to say it,” she hissed between kisses, “for the very first time while I was sitting on the floor? After all the damn romance novels you’ve memorized?”</p><p>He laughed against her mouth and nodded, the kiss becoming messier as she tried to lightly thump him over the head. He reached down and hooked his hands under her thighs, lifting her up and beginning to stumble his way to the bedroom.</p><p>“I was going to do a nice thing and cook you dinner,” he huffed as she bit down on his lower lip. “But now I think when we’re done with <em>this </em>I’m going to make you cook it since you’re being so mean about how I share feelings.”</p><p>She was far past the point of arguing at that point, his hair tangled in her fingers and his body warm as she wrapped her legs tighter around his waist. “I love you,” she mumbled into his lips, and then immediately thought about changing her mind as he banged her shoulder against her own bedroom door in an effort to reach the doorknob.</p><p>He jolted as if she had shocked him and his head snapped back from hers. He stared at her, eyes intense while she gaped at him. She felt torn between giving him the time to process what she had thought would be obvious and lunging back in for his lips. A muscle in his jaw flexed and she had to restrain herself from pressing her mouth against it.</p><p>“You’re not just saying that to get me to cook dinner?”</p><p>She snorted, but softened when she saw the fragile hope in his eyes. “Obviously not, because I’m not a manipulative jerk, but if you’re that deeply concerned we can order takeout.”</p><p>His eyes lit up and she only had a split second to enjoy the sight before he was pressing back against her lips with a new excitement. She distantly registered the door clicking open behind her. <em>Finally</em>, she thought.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The first time Sakura had left for a mission after their relationship began, Kakashi was a menace.</p><p>He was grumpy with Shikamaru when he asked him come to the office to clarify some old notes he had made while he was Hokage, he was grumpy with Naruto when he seemed far too cheerful and had too many stories about how happy (<em>and safe inside the village</em>) Hinata was. He was grumpy with Genma when he came by to try and drag him out for Friday night drinks and ended up slamming the door in his face.</p><p>Genma had shook his head in utter disbelief when faced with Kakashi’s cold deadpan and then the unceremonious bang of his shabby apartment door. Part of him felt compelled to sneak over and try Kakashi’s window, but he had a feeling it was either booby trapped to hell or that he would find himself skewered on the end of Kakashi’s chidori. He had simply rolled his shoulders to shake away the tension and trudged down the stairs alone.</p><p>Awareness of Kakashi and Sakura’s relationship had begun to trickle throughout the village circles a couple weeks ago. It started out almost as a joke. Sakura, the pretty young prodigy surgeon that even the civilians liked, with Kakashi? The man who roamed around in a mask with a pack of dogs and porn (the fact that he had once held the most elevated position in the village aside)? No, the aunties had whispered. Such absurdity was not to be believed or entertained.</p><p>But those who knew them began to see pieces clicking into place. They saw Kakashi looking a little less morose, a little more put together. There was a new contented air about him—he smiled and laughed more easily. Sakura was a little less prone to bite the head off someone who asked a stupid question. Genma had seen them together once, strolling down the street with bags of groceries looking utterly mundane while Sakura nudged Kakashi’s shoulder with her own as if trying to get him to agree to something. He had smiled at her with disbelief and tenderness all wrapped up in one nauseatingly sweet expression that had made Genma’s jaw drop.</p><p>Genma had been thrilled—none of the women he had tried to set Kakashi up with had panned out, either because he would skip out on dates at the last minute, or because if he bothered to show up at all he would spend the evening staring blankly at whatever poor woman had been sent as if waiting for her to say something interesting. Once, as a last ditch effort, Genma had sent both Anko and Kakashi on a blind date, reasoning that Kakashi couldn’t possibly be bored by her. Genma had nearly had his head torn off by the two of them that same night, and he still had nightmares about Anko’s snakes trying to bite him in the ass while she cackled her usual maniacal laugh.</p><p>He stepped into the bar where the usual group met and heard them before he saw them. Kiba was telling a story that Genma could tell probably wasn’t that interesting, but he was telling it at maximal volume and with a drink sloshing about in his hand. Kurenai was shooting him side glances of disapproval, but she moved at the right times to dodge the splattering of his beer. Temari was arm wrestling Lee looking downright pissed, while Lee just seemed thrilled to finally have a worthy opponent. Tenten kept eyeing the pair of them from where she stood with Neji as if to make sure Temari hadn’t suddenly decided to snap Lee in half.</p><p>Genma felt throat catch when he finally found who he was really looking for. Ino was leaning against the bar, her hair strategically positioned in a long stream over her shoulder to catch the light in a way he was absolutely positive was intentional. She caught his eye, smirked, and then batted her lashes. As the two infamous flirts of the friend group they had been jokingly flirting in an attempt to, as Kurenai called it, “out scandalize” one another. They grew more and more outrageous each week, but Genma was beginning to realize somewhat uncomfortably that it was becoming less and less funny to him.</p><p>Perhaps one of the reasons he had been so thrilled about Kakashi and Sakura was that it was proof they <em>worked</em>. Sakura was a mature thirty, and Kakashi oscillated back and forth between being absurdly childish for a forty-year-old one moment and then seeming as though he were ancient the next. Genma wondered if their situation had given Ino any similar ideas.</p><p>“Hello, gorgeous,” he drawled, pulling a stool closer to hers than necessary and sliding onto it. She always smelled like the flower shop, fresh and green.</p><p>She rolled her eyes. “Points deducted for unoriginality, Shiranui. You’re only the fifth man to say that tonight.”</p><p>He wiggled his eyebrows at her comically. “But I’m the first you haven’t kicked in the shins, aren’t I?”</p><p>Ino grinned, all gleaming white teeth and flashing blue eyes. “Remains to be seen. It depends on how good of a job you can do. I’m giving you a chance because you’re pretty.” She eyed him up and down appreciatively, and he had to resist the urge to cringe when he felt his face warming. If she caught him blushing it would ruin their game, and perhaps everything else.</p><p>“For you, Ino, I would try my hardest.”</p><p>She smiled, but it had less of her usual coy charm. “As you should,” she said quietly. He felt his pulse quicken and he was opening his mouth to ask when she had meant when she flashed him a new dazzling smile, smoothing her hair back behind her ear and leaning back in a way that <em>he knew </em>that <em>she knew </em>made her neck look longer. The ostentatious flirting was back, and he felt himself deflate a bit.</p><p>“So,” she said. “Where is grumpy old sourpuss tonight?”</p><p>Genma chuckled. “Nearly hit me in the face with his front door when I told him he was being antisocial. I’m not sure why he’s in such a mood—Sakura said last week that she was just delivering supplies to a hospital in the Land of Earth. Lots of fun rocks there for her to smash if she gets into trouble. He’s acting like she was sent back to war or something.”</p><p>Ino paled for moment before she was rolling her eyes. “God, that is <em>rude</em>, even for him. I was so sure getting regularly laid would improve his mood.”</p><p>Genma shrugged. “I think he’s just lonely. I suppose when you spend a long time by yourself and you suddenly have someone to be <em>there</em>, it’s hard when they’re gone again.”</p><p>Ino watched him intently. “Do you ever get lonely, Genma?”</p><p>A thousand responses flashed through his mind, all equally corny and lewd. <em>I’m never lonely—I have plenty of people to keep me warm at night, sometimes more than one at the same time. </em>Or, perhaps even worse, <em>I’d be less lonely if you came home with me. </em>As tempting as it was to take the easy way out and say something that would get him an eyeroll and a smack upside the head later (courtesy of Kurenai) he decided that if Kakashi could manage the vulnerability required to actually make a meaningful connection, then he certainly could.</p><p>“I’m always lonely,” he said, watching carefully to see how she reacted. “The games are fun, but they aren’t real.”</p><p>Her eyes widened and he waited, nearly holding his breath, to see if she would respond with another flirty line or if she would go along with the new direction this was taking. Finally she smiled, and it wasn’t the broad and warm grin she gave to people she was trying to lure into her clutches. It was a softer smile, something a little more lopsided and rougher around the edges. He knew then he wasn’t looking at a strategy or a performance anymore—he was looking at Ino.</p><p>“I get lonely, too,” she confessed, picking her drink up and swirling it with an expert flick of her wrist. “It’s a little hard to sell flowers to adoring boyfriends all day.”</p><p>“Hold on,” he said, snatching up the damp napkin that had been sitting under her drink and inspecting it to see if it had picked up any of the grime from the counter. Then he was folding it in the way he remembered being taught—<em>one quarter, one eighth, you know it’s good if there aren’t spaces left between the folds, and—</em></p><p>And then he was holding a small, somewhat pathetic flower with a flurry of little triangles for petals. It seemed very trivial in the palm of his hand and he felt a sudden rush of self-consciousness as he held it out to Ino.</p><p>She stared down at it, the thick lines of her lashes obscuring the look in her eyes. “It isn’t a bouquet or anything,” he heard himself rambling, “but I am very much adoring, of you, I mean, so I think that should count for something.”</p><p>She took it with long elegant fingers, holding it in the palm of her hand like it was made of glass rather than a soggy little bar napkin. This, he thought, was the real Ino. She could be brash, loud, and vicious whenever she felt like it, but when she was presented with something small and fragile, it came to life under her touch. She looked up at him, and he thought the crooked smile on her face was <em>gorgeous. </em></p><p>“That counts for quite a lot, actually,” she whispered. She chuckled and he thought he almost heard a hitch of emotion in her voice. “Do you do this often? Make pretty girls flowers out of napkins when they’re feeling lonely?”</p><p>“Never, actually.” Her eyes leapt to his and he smiled. “My mom taught me when I was little. She said it would make me faster at doing hand signs when I got older. It’s something a little bit… private.”</p><p>She held it closer to her face. “Well,” she said. “I think it is the prettiest thing I have seen in a <em>very </em>long time.”</p><p>He agreed.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Ino was going to throttle Kakashi for killing her buzz.</p><p>She had left the bar breathless at the new sincerity in Genma’s eyes and with plans to meet him for dinner tomorrow night—somewhere that wasn’t a bar and somewhere that didn’t have Kiba chanting loud drunken nonsense in the background. The flower he had made her was still cupped in her palm and she held it close to her side lest anything happen to it. She could already tell that it was the type of thing she was going to keep forever.</p><p>She had stopped by Kakashi’s apartment on the way home to tell him off for being such a grouch, mainly because it put Sakura’s cover at risk. If he kept acting like she was going off to fight on the frontlines whenever she left, people would begin to catch on to the fact that <em>medical outreach</em> wasn’t the whole truth.</p><p>She knew he wasn’t inside his apartment when she finally got there—it was devoid of both chakra or mind signature, and her first reaction was utter panic followed by vicious swearing. If he had gone off to follow Sakura on her mission, which she honestly wouldn’t put past him, he could end up branded as treasonous for jeopardizing a black ops mission. She had debated her next course of action, and ultimately decided going directly to Naruto was her best bet. He was probably still awake—if his new baby had lungs like his she was surprised the whole village didn’t hear it going off constantly.</p><p>On the way to Naruto and Hinata’s house, fuming and cursing the day Kakashi was born and whatever forces had brought him into existence, she stopped short when she suddenly sensed a low flicker of his consciousness. She stood still on the sidewalk trying to pinpoint where his mind signature was coming from, and then she realized she had stood on the street a thousand times before. It was Sakura’s street.</p><p>Ino scowled. Sakura said she wouldn’t be back for <em>awhile</em>, and if she was lying to have more time for sex then Ino would have her head. She went chakra walking alongside the wall of Sakura’s building, making her way towards the window on the fifth floor. Sakura had taught her the seals to undo her window traps, and Ino was fully planning on leaping in on the two of them, a tirade about the importance of female friendships already being composed at the back of her mind.  </p><p>She peeked through the window, ready to bang it open, and then realized it was just Kakashi there.</p><p>Then her heart ached. He was fast asleep in Sakura’s bed, obviously having let himself in at some point after Genma left his place. Ino could see that Sakura’s favorite ratty old t-shirt was stretched over the pillow he was using, probably because it still smelled like her. His head was buried in it, and all she could see was the wild mess of his hair and the very tip of his nose over the top of the covers. Ino pressed her fingers to the corners of her eyes and patted away the dampness gathering there. It made her equal parts happy and sad to see her best friend be so, so loved, even when she wasn’t there to see it herself.</p><p>She walked back down the building, deep in thought. She remembered the time she had been asked to take care of Choji’s cousin’s new puppy. They had told her to do the exact same thing—put one of Choji’s cousin’s t-shirts in the puppy’s bed so it still had a familiar smell to comfort it. Ino could already hear herself making jokes about Kakashi being just like one of his ninken, a forlorn puppy without Sakura around, but then remembered how deeply personal and sad it had looked.</p><p>Well, she decided. She had been in a good mood when she left the bar, and she could keep some things to herself.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Sakura came back from her mission and Kakashi had a few days of being able to follow her around before he was sent on his own mission. She had been tight-lipped in her kitchen, obviously trying her hardest to keep on a brave face as she made him his own version of one of her first aid kits. She had handed it to him with all kinds of instructions—<em>the lighter colored soldier pills won’t burn you out as badly as the darker ones, but they’ll give you less chakra and they metabolize slower. The blue vial is a general antidote to most potions, and you should take it whenever anything metal from the enemy pierces your skin. </em></p><p>He had listened patiently, knowing if she forgot to tell him anything that she would fret about it until he returned. When she finally finished, slightly breathless from her long lecture, she had looked at him with something so <em>soft </em>and frightened in her eyes that he had pulled her into a tight hug, burying his nose in her hair.</p><p>“I’ll come back,” he mumbled. “I always do.”</p><p>She wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him so tightly that it <em>almost </em>hurt. “You better,” she whispered. “I don’t want to have to go back out there and steal another mission from your sorry ass.”</p><p>He snorted. “The same goes for you if you get sent out while I’m gone. I know you’ve got Pakkun wrapped around your finger now, and I don’t want to hear him lecture me if we end up having to track you down.”</p><p>Eventually he had to leave, but as he was passing through the gates he took one last glance at the village behind him. He found that he had never been quite so reluctant to go on a mission before.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Six months went by and life became impossibly good.</p><p>Eventually he had stopped renting his apartment and just moved into hers, and each day he woke up in what felt like a private universe. There were his books and her books stacked on top of one another on the nightstand. The small closet that had been nearly filled to capacity with her clothes had somehow managed to accommodate his as well. She set the box of his favorite tea leaves out on the counter in the mornings to simply make one step of waking up easier when he came out bleary-eyed, long after she had already left for the hospital.</p><p>He was happy.</p><p>He had always thought happiness was impossible—something permanently unattainable for him. He thought lifelong unhappiness was a sentence that had been decided for him the moment he wandered out of his room in the night to find his father’s body silently leaking blood onto the floor.</p><p>But now when he wandered out in the night for a glass of water, there was always a warm body waiting for him when he came back, breathing softly and filled with so much gentle and unconscious <em>life</em> that it nearly stole his breath away each time he crawled back beneath the covers.</p><p>It was lonely when she left on missions, but pieces of her were still <em>everywhere</em> around him—from the smell of her shampoo that lingered on her pillow to the stacks of medical notes she had a habit of leaving in her wake whenever inspiration for a new technique struck. On the days she was gone, he found himself making excuses to come back to the apartment, and he would take a moment to simply sit on the couch and take it all in. He would sit and breathe in the feeling of <em>home </em>that permeated every bit of the small and cramped space that held so much of the both of them.</p><p>So when there had been a loud and incessant tapping at the window in the middle of one of the nights when she wasn’t there, something in him iced over with a fear so cold it felt like it would kill him. He made the hand seals that deactivated the traps and opened the window to the ANBU agent.</p><p>“You have been summoned to the Hokage’s office for an immediate audience.”</p><p>Kakashi nodded numbly and got up to retrieve his weapons pouch and the first aid kit she had made all those months ago. He had no evidence that this had anything to do with Sakura—there were plenty of possible crises that didn’t involve her at all. Still, when he set off as quickly as he could for what was now Naruto’s office, he felt his hands begin to shake. When he was close enough he shunshined into the office that had once been his.</p><p>The first thing he noticed was the grave and apologetic look on Naruto’s face. Then he turned to the two chakra signatures to his left and saw two bedraggled ANBU agents, each hastily bandaged and pressing hands against wounds to staunch bleeding. He realized who they were—</p><p>They were Sakura’s teammates. And she was nowhere to be seen.</p><p>“No,” he heard himself say, the roaring in his ears making him feel like he was speaking from a thousand miles away.</p><p>“Kakashi—”</p><p>“I said, <em>no</em>.”</p><p>“Kakashi, please sit down—”</p><p>“<em>No,</em>” he heard himself hiss, as he whirled on her two teammates, Falcon and Deer. He could see their wide eyes through the slits of their masks, and he realized belatedly that the fact he hadn’t been asked to wear his mask to hide his own identity meant they no longer cared about protecting Sakura’s.  </p><p>He was on them in an instant, his hand curled around a warm neck and shaking a body against a wall. “What did you do with her? What did you do—”</p><p>Then a hand had yanked him away and pinned his arms behind his back. He swiveled his head around to meet blue eyes full of grief and anger. “Kakashi, you do not get to take this out on your fellow shinobi—"</p><p>“Shut up,” he spat, and felt a flicker of guilt that was gone in the next instant when Naruto recoiled slightly. “Tell me where you sent her, what you did—”</p><p>He heard the crackle of chakra as a new body shunshined into the room and Kakashi turned to find Ibiki taking in the scene. Ibiki’s eyes traveled to where Falcon was gasping on the floor with a hand pressed to his neck, finally landing on Naruto, who held Kakashi in a tight grip.</p><p>“Where is she,” Kakashi heard himself bark at Ibiki, who was known to be a co-commander of the ANBU. “What have you done?”</p><p>Ibiki watched him, his eyes dark and unreadable. There was a moment of silence filled only by Falcon gasping quietly.</p><p>“Tiger was sent with her team to acquire a forbidden jutsu scroll in the Mist. Our information turned out to be false and there was an ambush waiting for them at the border.”</p><p>Naruto grunted as Kakashi fought to get to Ibiki, who merely watched without flinching. “They broke free of the ambush but were pursued back into the Land of Fire. Tiger realized they would soon be outpaced, so she sent Deer and Falcon on ahead—”</p><p>“Stop <em>calling her that</em>,” he heard himself hiss, feeling as though he was spiraling into free fall. “That isn’t who she is.”</p><p>He finally saw the flicker of a reaction in Ibiki’s eyes. “Tiger did her duty. She spared two of her teammates—”</p><p>“And you left her,” Kakashi remembered, swinging back around to Falcon and Deer. He felt something searing in his gut at the idea of Sakura ushering them on, deciding that they deserved more time. “You <em>scum.</em>”</p><p>Deer flinched as if he had slapped her, and Falcon merely stared, hand still on his throat where Kakashi could see his own fingerprints blooming in dark purple blotches against the skin. Naruto tightened his grip.</p><p>“That is enough, Kakashi. Not everyone lives their life according to your code—”</p><p>Rage flashed through his body and he wrenched himself out of Naruto’s grip, spinning around to pin him against the wall, hand on his neck, the other held back in preparation to strike. He felt the energy in the room shift as Ibiki and the agents tensed. He had just attacked the Hokage, an act of treason. Kakashi almost wanted to laugh—all of this shock and outrage after he had hauled the village along on his back after the war in this very same office. He could be the first ever past Hokage to be sent to jail, but he found he didn’t care one bit.</p><p>He gazed into Naruto’s eyes and saw the same aching bottomless grief there he felt in his own, but he also saw a resignation to reality. He saw the stupid placid excuse there—an understanding that Sakura had done her <em>duty</em>.</p><p>“Don’t,” Kakashi heard himself hiss as the hand he had poised to strike shook. “Don’t tell me she did her duty when <em>you</em> get to go <em>home </em>to someone.”</p><p>Naruto’s face crumpled. “You don’t think I’m in pain? I’m falling apart here, but do you really think attacking the people she saved was what she would have—”</p><p>“Don’t,” Kakashi repeated, his voice low and cold. “Don’t talk about her like she’s gone.”</p><p>“It’s been twelve hours since the original attack—”</p><p>“<em>I mean it.</em>”</p><p>Naruto fell silent and just stared. Kakashi felt himself shudder, as if he was going to break apart into small pieces, but then he took a slow, deep breath in and shoved Naruto away. Naruto stumbled and turned back to look at Kakashi, guilt written into every single line on his face as tears gathered in the corners of his eyes. It almost seemed like he wished Kakashi had struck him.</p><p>“You know I would have done anything to stop this from happening—”</p><p>“Where was she last,” Kakashi said, turning his attention back to Falcon and Deer. They jolted at the return of his focus, but Deer spoke.</p><p>“She left us about an hour from the bridge. She headed east to lead them off the trail.”</p><p>He moved towards the window and Naruto grabbed his arm. “What are you doing, Kakashi?”</p><p>“She’s still out there.”</p><p>Pain lanced across Naruto’s face. “Kakashi, I don’t think she is—”</p><p>“She made me a promise.”</p><p>Naruto blinked, as if surprised by the idea that anyone other than him could make promises. “I understand, but you need to prepare yourself given the odds—”</p><p>“I’m leaving,” Kakashi snapped, feeling the fury rising back up in his chest as he shook his arm out of Naruto’s grip. The promise she had given him was the only thing holding him together at this point. It gave him an objective, something to do other than falling apart into a howling mess. He had trained with Sakura in the last few months—he knew what she was capable of, and Naruto did not.</p><p>
  <em>I have a special seal which makes me very, very hard to kill. I seriously doubt there is something out there in the world that could prevent me from crawling back home to you.</em>
</p><p>“It’s too dangerous,” Ibiki said, speaking for the first time in awhile. “Sakura was sent with a team for a reason. You need to wait for us to assemble a search team if you’re so hell bent—”</p><p>“<em>I am leaving.</em>” He paused at the window, sweeping his gaze back over the room that had once been his office. “I have sacrificed plenty for this village, but I will not sacrifice her.”</p><p>With that he slipped out into the night and shot back towards their apartment. He wouldn’t put it past Naruto or Ibiki to try and stop him, and if they did there would be a real fight. He slipped through their window into the apartment, and the sudden wave of smells—of Sakura, of the detergent they both used, of the lingering candle she had burned last week before she left— crashed over him all at once and he felt himself stumble. Blood roared in his ears and he had to remind himself there was still something to be done, that now was not the time for this, but there was a pain unfolding in his chest so vicious and biting that it left him breathless.</p><p>He fished in his weapons pouch for the familiar scroll and bit his thumb hard enough to taste blood. When Pakkun appeared a moment later, Kakashi let himself sag to the floor and sit beside him.</p><p>“Kakashi,” Pakkun asked tentatively, pawing at his hand. “What is it?”</p><p>Kakashi swallowed the emotion in his throat, remembering an old joke.</p><p>
  <em>I know you’ve got Pakkun wrapped around your finger now, and I don’t want to hear him lecture me if we end up having to track you down.</em>
</p><p>How could they have joked together so easily, so simply about such things? How had they lived with it?</p><p>“Sakura is missing,” he heard himself say. “Somewhere near the bridge to the Mist. Last seen heading east.”</p><p>There was a long silence as Pakkun digested this. “I see. I’ll find something here with her scent and we’ll set out to find her.”</p><p>Kakashi nodded numbly. What would he do if the trail led to nothing? Or even worse, to a body? He felt himself spiraling until a cold nose nudged at his hand.</p><p>“It’s time to go, Kakashi.”</p><p>He hauled himself back to his feet and fished in his pocket for the first aid kit. He popped a solider pill into his mouth and was wrapping the package back up when he felt Pakkun pawing at his foot. “I want one too.”</p><p>He gazed down at his summon and old friend. “Are you sure? You’ll be very tired afterward.”</p><p>“It’s Sakura,” Pakkun said simply.</p><p>Kakashi nodded, fishing out another soldier pill and breaking it in half between his fingers. He held it out to the small ninken. “It’s Sakura,” he agreed.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>It had been about ten hours since they set out. The landscape grew thicker and greener and the air became muggy as they approached the ocean. He was feeling desperately aware of the fact that she had officially been MIA for nearly twenty-four hours.</p><p>Pakkun had picked up her scent, and they found the original site of the ambush about a mile away from the bridge. The trees were studded with kunai, and the surrounding vegetation looked like it had been sucked dry of water for a jutsu. The ground of the clearing had been shattered around a large crater and Kakashi leapt to the center of it. He was sure this is how she had created a distraction big enough to allow her other team members to escape, especially if she had refrained from showing her true strength during the first half of the fight.</p><p>Kakashi knelt on the hard-packed earth at the epicenter of the blast and found the indents that he knew would be there—five small holes in the earth, one for each of her knuckles. He let his finger trace the outline where her hand had struck the earth.</p><p>He understood now why her teammates had left her. They must have realized who she was the moment she shattered the ground. Just like Naruto and Sasuke, Sakura had become a bit of a legend over the years. They must have felt like they were leaving someone larger than life itself behind, and in a way, they were.</p><p>He stood when Pakkun called him back. He had picked up the second trail where she had veered off as a decoy and estimated that about ten or eleven scents followed hers.</p><p>They found the first two bodies a few minutes later.</p><p>The first body had been gored through the center, a large hole left gaping in the chest of the man who had been foolish enough to get into her striking range. The other body was pinned to a tree by the neck with a long kunai that had sunk through his throat and into the wood. Kakashi felt a thrill of hope travel through him. Sakura had been intending to put up a fight.</p><p>They continued onwards.</p><p>The next body they found had been shattered against the trunk of a tree. It had fallen in a heap on the ground in a pile of sickeningly wrong angles. Kakashi’s mind pieced together the scene—this one had caught up with her, and she had managed to catch and throw him. He tried not to think about the blood splattered around the tree branches in this area, which was too widely spread to have belonged to the man alone.</p><p>The next body was plastered to a hasty earth wall. Kakashi was beginning to see Sakura’s strategy—hold back as much information about her skills as possible to keep them afraid while they pursued her. They might have assumed she was only skilled in hand-to-hand combat and forgot to watch out for ninjutsu. Each one that caught up to her was met with a nasty new end, which likely made the remaining rogue ninja more inclined to decide she wasn’t worth the trouble.</p><p>The next two bodies had seemed different from the others—nothing was broken or wrong with any of their limbs, and their faces were blank and unseeing. Kakashi was beginning to think they had just dropped dead when he saw the spikes sticking up through the bottom of their sandals. He was vividly reminded of finding a green sticky note that had been slapped to their refrigerator door in haste: <em>Poison on weapons you don’t throw so they don’t realize? Wire? Spikes? Might need genjutsu. Simple poppy-based poison—odorless, blend in with plants. </em></p><p>He had joked that she shouldn’t put sticky notes about formulas for poison where they stored their food, and she had knit her brow in mock annoyance and snarked that she didn’t get to choose when genius struck. He stared at the bodies and mused that Sakura was a very frightening woman, and he loved her dearly for it. It kept her alive.</p><p>They saw a couple more bodies, but Kakashi was beginning to focus on the evidence of more labored struggles. There were more kunai sunken into trees, more churned craters in the earth, and more bloodied wire left on the ground. He saw Pakkun sniffing patches blood, and he said nothing but knew that meant they had likely belonged to Sakura. His pulse was beginning to quicken as he realized that they were getting closer to the end of this gore-filled chase. He would find evidence that Sakura had survived, or he would find her body.</p><p>He saw another body beheaded, and another that looked like it had been blown apart from the inside—<em>If you go tattling to Naruto with scary stories, I’ll make every single one of your organs explode</em>. He finally stopped when Pakkun did. Pakkun had his head in the air and he was sniffing furiously. Kakashi waited, breathing shallowly.</p><p>Pakkun turned to him. “She’s gone.”</p><p>He froze. “You mean—”</p><p>“No, no,” Pakkun said quickly. “Her scent just disappeared. She was leaving a trail of blood, but here there isn’t any blood left. There are a couple more bodies that way, but I can’t smell her scent in any direction other than the one we came from. I would be able to tell if she had doubled back.”</p><p>Kakashi’s mind spun. “Is it possible she was… put in a scroll?”</p><p>Pakkun shook his head. “I don’t smell the residual chakra from anything like that. It’s like she just vanished. There seemed to be a couple of the enemy left alive but they went back towards the bridge and I don’t think she was with them.”</p><p>Kakashi surveyed the area around them. It was splattered with blood and gore, but there were no bodies. Perhaps more importantly, there was no large crater the way there had been at the last few battle sites.</p><p>“Pakkun,” he said slowly. “Would you be able to smell a clone?”</p><p>“A shadow clone, yes. A basic clone, no.”</p><p>Kakashi stared off into the distance, thinking for a moment. He had a suspicion of what had happened, but he was almost too afraid to hope he could be right. He had been masking his chakra since getting near the bridge to avoid attracting enemies, but he decided testing his theory was more than worth the risk. He unmasked his chakra signature for a moment and flared it softly before covering it again.</p><p>He waited in absolute stillness.</p><p>Then he felt it, a tiny warm flicker, weak and tired, but directly under his feet. His hands flashed through the hand signs and then he was sinking through the earth. He found himself in a dark underground cistern, the air ripe with the rusty tang of blood and dirt.</p><p>“Sakura? Sakura, where are you?”</p><p>“Here,” he heard her frail voice echo.</p><p>His eyes adjusted to the dark as he stumbled towards the sound of her voice and he stopped short when he finally saw her.</p><p>His first thought was that his mind was playing tricks on him, and that she was dead after all. She was lying in a wide pool of blood, a long, thin blade made in the style of the Mist impaled through her stomach. There were other kunai littering her body, all leaking slow streams of red. Her green eyes and the pale light of her glowing seal were the only bits of brightness. Her eyes gazed out at him from her gaunt face. His gaze traced down the tattooed lines emanating from her seal.</p><p>“It’s really me,” she whispered, seeming to understand what he was thinking.</p><p>Then the spell broke and he surged forward, overcome with conflicting waves of relief and terror. He snatched up her hand, wet with blood, and clutched it against his chest as he kneeled by her. “How are you alive, is it—”</p><p>Her cracked lips curled into a smile. “I told you, my seal makes me very hard to kill.” Her eyes darkened. “Tsunade never told me how tempting it would be to let the jutsu go.” She trailed off and let out a slow controlled breath and squeezed his hand. “But I had a good reason to hold out.”</p><p>He was utterly overcome. He had gone through his life watching the people around him die miserably, horribly, or finding them after the fact in a pool of their own blood. Sakura had been impaled, but she had managed to find a way to keep herself alive in a state of waking torture to make sure he found her, rather than her dead body. His fingers lifted to her face, trailing down the dark lines of her seal that curled over her cheeks.</p><p>“Thank you,” he whispered.</p><p>She smiled, and beneath under all the grime, blood, and seal marks, all he could think was there was nothing more vital or precious than the <em>life </em>still flickering in her eyes. “You’re welcome.”</p><p>“How do I get you back to the village?”</p><p>She sighed and glanced down at the sword buried in her midsection. “I need to stay conscious to hold the jutsu. I would have pulled this thing out a while ago and healed it if I thought I could have done it without sending myself into shock. You should break off the top but leave the inside intact. I’ll be easier to carry that way.”</p><p>He felt himself pale and she gripped his wrist. “I know you’re afraid of hurting me, but I’m really tired of feeling like a piece of meat skewered on a sharp stick.”</p><p>He chuckled shakily. “You must be better than I think you are—the obscene humor is still around.”</p><p>She guided his hand to midway down the blade. “Snap it here. The metal is brittle. I loosened it up for you by trying it myself with some chakra strength earlier.” She smiled bitterly. “Couldn’t quite manage it, but I think you’ll have better luck.”</p><p>He took a slow breath and then fitted his hands around the thin line of metal. He counted to three in his head, and then snapped it to the side. He felt the small jolt of movement that ran down into the part still buried in her body and she let out a low hiss.</p><p>“Are you—”</p><p>“I’m fine.”</p><p>She took in a few shuddering breaths and squeezed his hand. “There were twelve of them waiting in the trees for us,” she finally said. “One of them had Zabuza’s sword.”</p><p>His eyes widened. “Kubikiribōchō? We gave it back to the Mist after the war.”</p><p>She shook her head. “All their headbands were slashed through. I think the Mizukage might be having some problems she hasn’t wanted to tell us about.”</p><p>“How did you—”</p><p>“He wasn’t as good with it as you were,” she said, smiling. “You might have given me a run for my money, but I handled him just fine. Some of his friends were honestly more impressive than he was. The sword is somewhere back there in the forest.”</p><p>He nodded, thinking he couldn’t give less of a damn about the sword. “How do I get you home?”</p><p>She pressed her lips together. “You’ll have to carry me. I can hold the jutsu.”</p><p>He watched her carefully. “The jostling won’t bother you?”</p><p>She smiled grimly. “Oh, it will. But my blood has been replenishing at an unnatural rate for the last day or so. I can keep it together a little while longer.”</p><p>He nodded and slid his arms underneath her legs and back, his sleeves soaking into the pool of blood she would be leaving behind. “Are you ready,” he asked.</p><p>She nodded. He stood and felt the blood dripping back down his arms as she gasped. “Listen,” she said in a strained voice. “If more of them show up I have five or so minutes left of fighting in me, but I don’t want you to die staying—"</p><p>“I’m not going back to the village without you,” he said simply.</p><p>She gazed at him, her green eyes angry at first, then softening with understanding. “Okay then. Better move quickly.”</p><p>He propelled them back up into the earth and then they were back in the daylight, everything feeling too bright and harsh.</p><p>“Kakashi,” he heard Pakkun snap as he blinked blearily. “Why didn’t you tell me you were—is that Sakura?”</p><p>“Hi, Pakkun,” Sakura said, waving faintly. “Thank you for finding me.”</p><p>Pakkun gaped at her, and then he bared his teeth at her in a small canine smile. “No problem.”</p><p>“Pakkun, we need to get back without encountering any other ninja. Can you lead the way?”</p><p>Pakkun trotted to the trees. “Leave it to me.”</p><p>Kakashi clutched Sakura a little tighter to his chest. He felt her hand wind its way up his chest to rest gently on his shoulder. “We’re going to be alright,” she whispered.</p><p>He looked down at her. Her face was even paler in the sunlight, still crusted with blood and tight with the look of restrained pain. He felt part of himself soften impossibly, flooded with relief, love, and terror all at once.</p><p>“I know,” he said quietly.</p><p>Then they started on their way back home.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>When they got to the hospital, Tsunade was beside herself with worried rage. She snatched Sakura out of Kakashi’s arms, nearly knocking him back out of the window he had just climbed through. In some ways Tsunade had known this day would come ever since Sakura had come to her, solemn faced with a request for her to come back to the hospital while she was on missions. Tsunade hated to be proved right.</p><p>“Hold the justu,” she barked at Sakura, who was beginning to look impossibly pale and drained.</p><p>Sakura had nodded weakly. “Liver hemorrhaging,” she mumbled. “Last hour.”</p><p>Tsunade paled, then shot Kakashi a venomous look as if to accuse him of traveling too slowly. Tsunade felt herself soften a bit when she saw the anguished look in his eyes as they tracked over Sakura, her stomach still dribbling blood onto the hospital floor as Tsunade rushed her to an operating room.</p><p>“Is she going to be alrigh—”</p><p>“Yes, yes,” Tsunade head herself snap as she gazed down at the woman she had practically adopted as her own daughter. She would not lose another precious person—<em>not this one. </em></p><p>Tsunade finally made it to the operating room and shut the door as kindly as she could—which wasn’t very kindly at all—in Kakashi’s face. As soon as his line of sight was cut off, Tsunade watched as Sakura’s face morphed into a mask of pain. Ever the one to pretend she wasn’t suffering, Tsunade thought. She laid Sakura gently on the table and snatched up forceps to extract the remaining piece of the blade.</p><p>“Ouch,” Sakura said, chuckling somewhat hysterically as blood bubbled from her lips.</p><p>Tsunade glared at her. “You stupid, stupid girl. How many times have I told you, anywhere but the stomach—”</p><p>“I remembered. Wasn’t fast enough, too many,” Sakura mumbled as Tsunade cut her clothes away and clasped her forceps on the protruding piece of metal. One glowing green hand lit upon Sakura’s stomach, soothing a bit of the pain.</p><p>“I can’t numb you completely. I’ll pull you out of shock if you go into it, but to heal you quickly enough I need you to tell me what’s going on inside.”</p><p>Sakura nodded, her jaw tense. “I know.”</p><p>Tsunade felt emotion welling up in her chest as she pressed one hand against Sakura’s forehead, a brief soothing touch. “I’m so proud of you. You’ve been so brave.”</p><p>Sakura’s eyes glowed for a moment, a bit of joy and love breaking through the pain. “Thank you,” she mumbled.</p><p>“Alright then,” Tsunade said, taking a breath to steady herself. “On three.”</p><p>“One, two, <em>three.</em>”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Sakura woke up three days later with a dull feeling of pain in her stomach and her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth. She glanced around herself and took in the blurry shapes. The beeping was her monitor next to the IV stand, and the warm pressure in her hand was another hand. She looked up and found dark eyes fixed on her face.</p><p>She smiled then, knowing wherever she was and whatever was going on that she was safe. “Kakashi,” she said.</p><p>She could see the emerging relief and joy in his eyes. “You’re awake,” he croaked in a hoarse voice.</p><p>Sakura nodded. She reached her hand out, annoyed to find that it was weak enough to tremble. He pulled his mask down and reached out to guide her hand to his face. She felt the stubbly warmth of his cheek against her palm and smiled.</p><p>“You haven’t been shaving?”</p><p>He shook his head and Sakura realized just how <em>exhausted </em>he looked. His shoulders were hunched over and he had fatigue written into every line on his face.</p><p>“You’ve been sleeping?” She asked, a little sterner this time. He cracked a smile at her commanding tone.</p><p>“A little bit,” he said vaguely, the hand that held hers to his cheek squeezing tightly.</p><p>She scowled and then glanced around herself, looking for clues as to how long she had been there. “I remember the cave,” she murmured, hazy memories surfacing in her mind. “Sending the clone out and throwing up a smoke screen. And then you…” She trailed off and her eyes returned to his. “You came to find me?”</p><p>He nodded. “Of course I did.”</p><p>“You didn’t get in any trouble for it, did you?”</p><p>She saw the flicker of something colder in his eyes. “No,” he said with a new edge in his voice. “I didn’t.”</p><p>She watched him carefully, wondering who she would have to apologize to for whatever he had done. She supposed she couldn’t fault him—if someone told her he was MIA on a mission, she would shred the village to pieces brick by brick if anyone tried to stop her from going to look for him.</p><p>“Sakura,” he said, and she could hear a new strained note in his voice. “Tsunade was asking me how long you maintained the Creation Rebirth Jutsu. She seemed very concerned when I told her it had been a day and a half. I’m not very familiar with the jutsu, but doesn’t it…”</p><p>Sakura pressed her lips together and drew his hand down to her chest where she laid it over her collarbone. “It does burn up some of my lifespan.”</p><p>He watched her, torment filling his eyes and Sakura realized then why he hadn’t been able to sleep. He had probably been terrified of her suddenly dying in her sleep.</p><p>“How much,” he whispered.</p><p>Sakura shrugged, feeling the prickling of tears beginning at the corners of her eyes, grieving for him more than herself. “Tsunade and I don’t really know. A year or two, maybe. A little bit more, or a little bit less. There isn’t really a precedent to follow, but based on the number of my cells that were forced to divide… Probably several years.”</p><p>He gazed at her with such fear and sadness that she felt like she would snap in half. “But hey,” she whispered. “You’re what, like a decade older than me? A ripe old forty? It will all even out in the end. I’m just catching up.”</p><p>For the first time since she had known him, she saw tears gathering at the corners of his eyes. He gripped her hand so tightly that it almost hurt. “I don’t know how to live with that,” he whispered.</p><p>She shook her head, feeling a tear streak down her face. “I don’t either,” she said. “But I think we have to.”</p><p>They sat in silence for a while, clinging to each other’s hands, and Sakura could tell he was thinking the same thing she was—they were <em>alive </em>now. That was really all each of them had.</p><p>“I yelled at your teammates,” he finally said, a little sheepishly. “I might have called them some names.”</p><p>She grinned. “Name calling? From the old Rokudaime? They must have been quaking.”</p><p>“They shouldn’t have left you.”</p><p>She scowled at him. “I made them leave. They hadn’t wanted to, but I knew if I didn’t…” He was watching her with an accusing look in his eyes and she sighed. “You have to understand what it was like, Kakashi. This group of missing nin materializing, one of them with Zabuza’s sword? It felt like I was standing there with Naruto and Sasuke all over again, but like I could finally <em>save </em>them from it all.”</p><p>Kakashi frowned. “So you’re justifying this with your hero complex?”</p><p>Sakura rolled her eyes. “You’re one to talk.”</p><p>He sighed. “Well, in any case you are getting a nice long break, and I am too.”</p><p>“A break?”</p><p>“Yours is medical—Tsunade has mandated three months at <em>minimum</em>. She seemed ready to kill you over it if you argue, so I would advise against it.”</p><p>Sakura raised an eyebrow. “And your break?”</p><p>A sly smile curled over his face. “I’ve been suspended for insubordination and attacking the Hokage. I’ve been demoted from my position as ANBU captain.”</p><p>“You didn’t,” she gasped.</p><p>He shrugged. “I don’t think Naruto would have punished me at all, but he was feeling bad. He wanted to give us some time together. My sentence just happens to be exactly as long as your break.”</p><p>Sakura’s brow knit. “But your captain position…”</p><p>His smile grew. “That’s right, I’ll have to be transferred to a new team to prevent any conflicts with the new captain. Coincidentally, there is a highly esteemed ANBU captain who will need a new team since her cover was blown. And partially because her angry boyfriend tried to throttle one of her old teammates, though that is neither here nor there.”</p><p>Sakura raised her eyebrows. “Are you implying what I think you’re implying?”</p><p>Kakashi nodded, his smile turning into a smirk. “Naruto was really groveling. I think he would put your face on Hokage mountain in apology if he could.”</p><p>“So they’re going to overlook our… personal relationship and allow us to be on the same team?”</p><p>“I think Naruto and Ibiki realized they were running the risk of the two of us abandoning other responsibilities. Ibiki said we ‘thought we were too damn important for our own good.’ It was probably Shikamaru’s idea, but I think they’re hedging their bets by putting us on the same team. Otherwise they probably would have had to demote us from ANBU, and I don’t think they have the numbers to afford that.”</p><p>Sakura grinned. “So when we get put back on a team together in a couple months… I’ll be your captain?”</p><p>Kakashi nodded. “Looks like it.”</p><p>Sakura wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “That will be… exciting.”</p><p>A little bit of color rose to his cheeks but he just rolled his eyes at her. “As if you don’t already order me around.”</p><p>“So when you leave dirty dishes on the windowsill, I can say, <em>your captain orders you to clean up your mess</em>. Or when you turn the fan on the highest setting, I can say, <em>turn that fan off; captain’s orders.</em>”</p><p>He deadpanned at her. “Having fun?”</p><p>She grinned. “Ooh, ooh, you mean when you’re using up all the hot water in the shower I can say, <em>that’s against mission protocol—</em>”</p><p>He cut her off by pressing his lips gently against hers for a brief moment before leaning back. She pouted and he chuckled. “I don’t want to suffocate you. You’re going to have to wait the week in the hospital like everyone else does before you come home. Tsunade has said very explicitly that you aren’t allowed to use your own chakra to heal yourself.”</p><p>“We’ll see about that,” Sakura grumbled. “This is still my hospital, too.”</p><p>Kakashi shrugged. “I’m on her side. I want you to get better.”</p><p>Sakura gave him a soft smile. “I will.”</p><p>Then the door banged open against the wall, and Tsunade stood framed in the doorway.</p><p>“You didn’t come get me when she woke up,” she growled.</p><p>Kakashi had already yanked his mask back up and was leaning away from her menacing presence. Sakura noted with some amusement that he seemed to be trying to angle himself such that Sakura’s bed was between him and Tsunade. She supposed chivalry was too much to ask for in the face of Tsunade’s wrath.</p><p>“She just woke up,” he was saying, nudging Sakura to get her to confirm.</p><p>“I just woke up,” Sakura parroted, a smirk on her face.</p><p>Tsunade looked thunderous for a moment and then sighed. “Out,” she said jabbing her finger at Kakashi. “You can slink back in here once I’ve looked her over.”</p><p>Kakashi reluctantly made his way to the door and slipped out with one last wave.</p><p>“Thank you for healing—” Sakura started to say.</p><p>“Oh, be quiet,” Tsunade snapped, striding forward to press her hand to Sakura’s stomach. “I can’t believe you’re putting me through all this stress after retirement, dragging me back into the hospital and showing up half-dead. I should be gambling and drinking myself silly somewhere.”</p><p>Sakura smiled, knowing this gruff lecturing was how her old teacher showed her love. “Everything you taught me kept me alive out there. Thank you.”</p><p>Tsunade paused in her healing, her gaze flashing back to Sakura’s eyes. Sakura watched as emotion welled up in them as she pressed her hand against Sakura’s forehead.  </p><p>“I knew you were a good choice to carry on my legacy, Sakura,” she said quietly. “You’re a real fighter.”</p><p>Sakura felt a knot of emotion gathering in her throat but then Tsunade had lightly thumped her on the head and went back to healing. “But if you ever come back in here with another stomach wound there is going to be <em>hell to pay. </em>You hear me?”</p><p>Sakura nodded. “Of course, shishou.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>They spent most of their two-month break curled up in bed. Sakura slept a lot the first few weeks, but eventually she was able to read for most of the day next to Kakashi. She had finally caved and nudged him in the ribs while he was beside her, gesturing for one of his trashy romance novels and tossing her dense medical text back to the pile at the foot of the bed. He had grinned smugly, but wordlessly handed her one of his favorites from the top of his stack while she glared.</p><p>They ate a lot of takeout, neither of them really feeling in the mood to cook. All of their friends kept coming by with either food or gifts. Gai made a surprisingly good soup, which he had claimed was full of <em>high-power ingredients for restoring youthful vigor</em>. Kakashi had eyed the soup with skepticism until Sakura pinched him in the side to get him to say thank you.</p><p>Shikamaru came by with a shogi board a couple times and he and Sakura had long matches that either ended in her cheering loudly or swearing viciously. Once they had tried to teach Kakashi some strategies and he began to appreciate why Sakura had scored the highest in her class on her written chunin exams, though Shikamaru grouched that he hadn’t really been trying. Kakashi found himself looking forward to being on her team and seeing how she strategized in the field.</p><p>Naruto and Hinata came by the first week, and Naruto had clung to Sakura, weeping and apologizing while Kakashi awkwardly brought Hinata into the kitchen and asked for her opinion on their tea collection to give the two some privacy. Once Sasuke had made an impromptu visit during a brief return to the village and Kakashi hadn’t quite known what to do with himself. He didn’t feel jealousy—he knew they were long, <em>long</em> past that stage, but he wasn’t able to stop himself from hovering somewhat anxiously in the doorway while they hugged. Sasuke had mellowed considerably, but it only took a brief effort to remember Sakura sprawled out on the rocks, having been brutally murdered in her mind’s eye under his genjutsu.</p><p>One morning Ino had come, bearing cartons from Sakura’s favorite dango shop and a couple boxes of fancy loose leaf tea. Ino’s eyes were bright as she steered Sakura gently to the couch, chattering about her new relationship with Genma. Kakashi had tried not to listen as he quietly made tea in the background, but he couldn’t help the curiosity he felt about the longtime rogue’s apparent soft side. He was beginning to realize that they all had soft sides, for the right person.</p><p>Finally, Ino had leaned back on the couch with a dramatic sigh, sated with tea and sugar. “Life is good. You know, Shikamaru proposed to Temari last week.” Her eyes danced with a knowing gleam between Sakura and Kakashi. “It’s supposed to be a beautiful spring next season. When are you two going to get married?”</p><p>Sakura flushed and Kakashi stared blankly. “We’re already married.”</p><p>“<em>WHAT</em>,” Ino shrieked in a voice piercing enough that Kakashi felt like he had sustained head trauma. Sakura spun and gaped at him.</p><p>“Kakashi, do you know something I don’t?” she snapped, her face bright red as Ino continued to wail her indignation at being excluded in the background.</p><p>Kakashi felt his own face warming. “I didn’t mean <em>literally. </em>I just meant…” He gestured to the apartment around them haplessly, beginning to feel deeply embarrassed. “It just—”</p><p>Sakura’s face softened as Ino stopped shrieking at the confirmation that there indeed hadn’t been a ceremony that she wasn’t invited to. “God,” Ino cried, “That is so <em>sweet</em>! Already married! I’m going to puke!”</p><p>Kakashi scowled. “If you do, you’re cleaning it up.”</p><p>Ino glared, but Kakashi felt Sakura subtly thread her fingers between his, squeezing gently. “Pig, you better not go around telling people about this. Some people are <em>private </em>about sentimental things—"</p><p>“But does that mean you’re engaged,” Ino asked, her blue eyes as wide as saucers as they flicked back and forth between Kakashi and Sakura. The two of them turned to each other, communicating with a meaningful look.</p><p>Sakura turned back to Ino and grinned. “It’s undecided, Ino. You can check back later—”</p><p>“<em>LATER</em>?” Ino squawked. “What did that look mean? What are you planning? If I’m not your maid of honor I’m going to <em>disembowel you with my bare hands, don’t think I won’t—”</em></p><p>“Thanks for the visit,” Sakura chirped, hauling Ino up by the arm with more than a little of her chakra strength. “You can come back at a later date, provided you’ve been discreet—”</p><p>“<em>Discreet—”</em></p><p>Sakura steered Ino out the door and then slammed it behind her, performing the hand seals that would keep even a kunoichi like Ino locked out. After a moment or two of more shouting, they heard Ino trudging away, still spouting colorful language on her way out of the building.</p><p>Sakura turned back to Kakashi, mirth glittering in her eyes. “Look, you got away with telling me loved me for the first time while I was sitting on the floor in here, but you are <em>not </em>going to get away with Ino proposing for you.”</p><p>Kakashi rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, I’ll consult the literature on the best way to go about this.”</p><p>“Good,” Sakura said haughtily, her nose in the air. “I’ll have you know that I have high expectations.”</p><p>Kakashi pushed himself up from the couch and made his way over to her, wrapping his arms around her waist, burying his nose in her hair. “You know, I really meant it, though. I was planning on living here forever, ring or no ring.”</p><p>Sakura squeezed him tightly. “Me too,” she whispered. “Me too.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hellooo! for anyone reading this wondering why I wrote this.... 20kish word thing instead of writing the last 1-2 chapters of Buried... it is because I am trash, plain and simple lol. There are a lot of similarities between this and Buried, and there is a reason for that! The main one being that I was rereading Buried so it was fresh in my mind when I wrote the ending and I went though what a lot of writers go through and decided I hated the whole thing and wanted to burn it and rewrite it. then the idea of rewriting it felt absurd, so I was like hm, what if instead of teaming up at the beginning... they end up on a team at the end...</p><p>so then I was like ok, alright, you can write like a 2-3k word oneshot to just get it out of your system. you know, as a little treat. and then taylor swift released an album and she said "How's one to know? I'd meet you where the spirit meets the bones" and I choked and wrote all 20k words of this in a manic caffeine-fueled frenzy. is the whole bit with Ino and Genma just in there because taylor swift said "I've got some tricks up my sleeve. Takes one to know one. You're a bandit like me." ?? perhaps. do I want to write deidara x sakura stuff now because of it? perhaps. </p><p>so tldr, thank you for reading this! it made me very happy, and I think it is what Buried would have been if I had... actually planned Buried out before I started writing it LMAO. I didn't even know what to call this, and I even considered just calling it Buried 2.0?? but then realized that probably wasn't the right vibe. if anyone is interested, I can write a follow-up proposal or maybe even wedding :^) but ONLY after Buried is DONE @myself</p></blockquote></div></div>
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